Do Sea Monsters Exist?
by Darkling Imp
Summary: Several months after the defeat of the Boogeyman, Jack Frost must protect Jamie Bennet from a tug-of-war between two seaborne "monsters": a demon with a taste for innocent blood, and the nemesis appointed by MiM to stop its preying on children...at any cost. Purely action/adventure. No pairings. Use of the "H" word (as a place).
1. Ch1 - The Strangest Things

**If I owned the rights to RotG or "The Guardians of Childhood" books, do you honestly think I would be writing fanfiction? Exactly.**

CHAPTER ONE

"The Strangest Things Can Start a Story"

Of all things that Jamie Bennet thought he would be doing during Christmas break, being in the middle of the ocean, looking at whales was not one of them. Not that he could complain. Quite the contrary: when Monty asked him to tag along, Jamie was ecstatic. When else would he have the chance to be on a real ship?

"Oh, wow, look at that!" he said, pointing his arm out as far as it could reach in the direction of a waterspout. "This is so cool. Thanks, Monty."

The blonde-haired boy returned Jamie's thankful grin, then pushed his glasses back up his nose. "No, thank _you_, Jamie. If you hadn't come along, I would have been miserable."

"Why's that?"

"Because," Monty said meekly, "I'm afraid of water."

Jamie scoffed. "C'mon, Monty, be serious!"

"I am being serious! Whoa!"

A strong gust of wind surged across the deck. Jamie almost slammed into Monty. When it had passed, he laughed loudly.

"Man, that was cool! With winds like that, I bet you could pull a Mary Poppins if you had an umbrella up here, right, Monty? Uh, Monty?"

Jamie glanced over at his friend. The color disappeared from Monty's already pale face, so now his freckles stood out like specks on a "connect-the-dot" page. He had hunkered down, his gloved hands were gripping the rail tightly, his teeth clenched and eyes clamped tightly shut.

"Are you alright?"

Monty shook his head.

"Hey, I was just kidding about the Mary Poppins bit," Jamie said, trying to smooth things over. "You really are afraid of water, aren't you?" Monty nodded. "But when? I mean, you went skating with me on the pond last week, and that's nothing but frozen water on top of more water!"

"It's not the same," Monty said. "Being out on the ocean is different. It's scary. If you're stuck out here, how can you get back? People used to die from being adrift at sea! And what if you got sick? Just how fast could you get to a hospital? Or if a storm came up? I mean, water conducts lightning, and we're floating in an endless pot of it!"

"You could just go inside if a storm came. Plus your aunt is a doctor, and she's working over on that ship."

Jamie pointed out toward a ship that was barely a dot on the horizon. There were three such ships out today, and they had passed several fishing trolleys over the past two days. Monty's uncle had explained how the cruise line worked, the way they set up a relatively well-trafficked route so that, if any of the ships met with any distress, the others could help it. The fact his uncle had been a cruise ship captain for ten years apparently wasn't helping. Monty's fear had won that battle.

"Why did you come if you are so afraid?"

"My parents went on a second honeymoon, and this was their Christmas present to me," he told Jamie. "I went on a small tour a few years ago. I didn't tell them, but never was I so happy to be back on dry land in my life!" He sighed wearily. Jamie frowned, and then looked up at the sky.

"It's getting late. Do you want to go inside for a little while?"

"Yes!"

Jamie tried not to laugh at Monty's enthusiasm. He helped steady his friend as the two of them made their way across the deck and toward the door that would take them below. As they headed into the warm bowels of the ship, Monty whispered.

"Jamie?"

"Yeah?"

"Do you...well..." Monty shook his head. "Never mind. It's a stupid question."

"What? Tell me."

"Promise you won't laugh?"

Jamie smiled. "I promise."

"Do you...believe in sea monsters?"

Jamie blinked a few times. "Sea monsters?"

"Yeah, sea monsters. Like that big fish that ate Jonah? Or...or those sea serpents pirates used to fear?"

"Why do you say that?"

Monty looked at the ground. "Well, Santa, the Tooth Fairy, the Sandman, the Easter Bunny, and Jack Frost are real," he reminded Jamie. "You know, I caught a glimpse of the Easter Bunny last year. It's kinda hard not to notice a six-foot-tall rabbit in a tree."

Jamie laughed. "What was he doing in a tree?"

"My neighbor had just got his new dog."

"Ah." Jamie remembered. That sheepdog was almost bigger than he was! "No wonder he was scared."

Before either of them could say anything else, a man in a dark navy uniform stepped onto the landing. He spotted them almost immediately.

"There you two are!" his voice boomed in the stairway.

Monty looked down. "H-hey, Uncle Preston."

"Enjoying the view, were you?"

"Yeah, we saw a waterspout!" Jamie said.

"Did you now? Well, you can tell me all about it at lunch. Let's go, boys."

Monty opened his mouth, likely to tell his uncle he didn't feel like lunch, but his stomach answered for him- loudly. Jamie had to laugh. _I guess fear doesn't do much to someone's appetite_. He made his way downstairs and into the ship's interior.


	2. Ch2 - In Which Jamie Talks to MiM

CHAPTER TWO

"In Which Jamie Talks to MiM"

That night, Jamie couldn't sleep.

He tried reading, having brought some of his favorite books with him, but that didn't seem to work. Monty had been out of it the moment his head hit the pillow. Jamie guessed the fear had drained him (although the good dinner they had helped). However, as full as his own stomach was, Jamie's mind was as alert as if someone had tossed a bucket of icy water on him.

_Can it be true? Do sea monsters really exist?_

The question had plagued him all afternoon. Monty had a good point: if the Guardians were real, then why not other mythological creatures? After all, Bigfoot was real; one of Santa's yetis had even signed his autograph to one of Jamie's books the morning after they defeated Pitch Black (boy, had that been a treat to wake up to!). Then there were the elves, Baby Tooth fairies...

He had to know.

That evening, Jamie poured over every book he had brought with him, but little could he find regarding sea monsters.

Finally, at three minutes after midnight, Jamie made up his mind. Quietly, so as not to wake Monty, he picked up the heap of clothes he wore earlier that day and pulled them on over his pajamas, grabbed a flashlight, and silently slipped from the room. He made his way past the few housekeepers and cruise patrons still milling about in the halls and up onto the deck.

It was much colder than it had been earlier. Jamie pondered shortly if his eyes could freeze in his head. He looked up at the sky and saw that, thankfully, the sky was mostly devoid of clouds and that the moon was full. Within a few minutes, Jamie had climbed up to one of the higher decks and found that it was secluded.

He crossed his arms over the rail and looked up. The moon was shining down, a pristine and flawless disc of silvery light against the dark night sky. Jamie took a deep breath, and then spoke.

"You're the Man in the Moon, right?" he asked. "The Guardians told me about you. You're the guy that chose them to watch over kids."

He paused for a moment, waiting to see if he could hear anything. He didn't.

"I don't know if you'd talk to kids. Jack said you don't talk to him, but you do to North sometimes. Well, even if you won't talk to me, maybe you'll at least listen?"

He pulled the flashlight out from his coat pocket. He hadn't actually needed it, since the moon and the Christmas lights strung out over the deck were enough to light his way. He flipped it on and off a few times. It felt better to have something in his hands in the dark, even if he didn't need it. He glanced back up at the moon.

"I just want to know this: are sea monsters real?"

Nothing but silence.

"My friend Monty- he believes in you guys, too, but I guess you know that. Anyway, he asked me earlier if sea monsters are real. I know the Guardians are real, and yetis, and elves...why not sea monsters? It's a scary thought. But hey," he shrugged, laughing nervously to himself, "so are giant horses made of bad dreams."

He waved his arms and shook his head.

"Never mind that. Sorry, I had to make a joke. I think Jack's rubbing off on me."

This time, he looked back up at the sky, staring straight up in earnest determination. _Focus, Jamie_, he told himself.

"Look...I'm curious. But I also have a friend who is scared of the ocean. The way he asked me about sea monsters out of the blue like that...I think that's why he's so afraid, and not because he's worried about getting sick at sea or something silly like that. I believe he's genuinely afraid of sea monsters."

He clicked the flashlight off. Then on again.

"Do they exist? If they do, are they friendly? Or are they evil? I just want to know."

Jamie stared up at the sky for a long time, waiting for an answer. All he got was the roar and biting chill of frigid wind as it whipped over the deck. Finally, he sighed and rested his chin on his arms, staring down at the trail of waves left behind as the ship cut through the water.

"I guess I should have expected that," he said. "If one of the Guardians can't get the Man in the Moon to answer him, then why did I think he'd talk to a kid?"

The wind blew another powerful gust, causing Jamie to grab the rail instinctively. When it was over, he pulled his hood back up, but noticed something was missing. He patted his head. His hat was gone!

He looked around, shining the flashlight across the deck, but he couldn't find it. Did it fall in the water? Jamie looked over the railing. If it was in the ocean, it was gone now. He groaned.

"That's just great. Mom's going to kill me. That was a new hat."

"I like the one with the snowflakes on it the best."

Jamie started. He knew that voice!

"Jack Frost!"

Floating in the air above him, twirling Jamie's knitted hat on one hand, was the Guardian of Fun himself. Jack laughed as he drifted down to the deck. He tossed Jamie's hat back to him, grinning.

"Glad I found ya'," he said. "All these cruise ships look that same."

Jamie pulled his cap back on and smiled at Jack.

"What are you doing here?"

"Preparing for a White Christmas, of course." Jack summoned a ball of snow in his hand, and then tossed it to the air, smacking it with his staff like a baseball bat up into the air. It hit one of the smokestacks and sent a spray of flurries all across the deck. "Can't let you get out of one even though you're at sea. Besides," he pointing his staff at Jamie's hand, "you kept flicking that thing on and off like you were calling for help."

Jamie looked down at his flashlight, noticing it was still on. He immediately flicked it off. "Well, I guess I was...sorta."

Jack stiffened and grasped his staff in both hands. "Why? Has someone been threatening you?" Jack's voice still sounded playful, but there was an almost feral glint to his eyes.

"No, nothing like that," Jamie reassured him. "I was talking to the Man in the Moon."

Jack's expression morphed from protective to confused. He leaned against his staff and looked at Jamie, his head cocked to the side. "Say what now?"

"Well, I talked. He didn't say anything."

Jack snorted. "What else is new?" He raised an eyebrow. "Why were you trying to talk to Manny?"

"I wanted to know if sea monsters are real."

"Sea monsters?"

"Yeah."

Jack straightened up and put his staff over his shoulders. "Sea monsters...sea monsters..." he murmured, almost as a mantra, as he paced about the deck.

"Have you ever seen one?"

"I haven't," Jack said. He stopped and turned to Jamie. "But I can't remember any of the other Guardians mentioning them, either."

"So they don't exist?"

Jack shrugged. "Beats me." Suddenly, a thought occurred to him. "Hey, I bet North would know. He's been around longer than the rest of us, 'cept maybe Sandy. Then again, I don't really know how old Sandy is, so-"

Jamie cut him off. "That's great, Jack! I can ask him in a few days on Christmas Eve!"

Jack chuckled. "I doubt you'll get the chance for that. Do you remember what Christmas Eve is like with North? Plus, the Sandman's on overdrive. You'll be knocked out long before Santa Claus comes to town." He noticed the dejected look on Jamie's face, and winked. "Don't worry. I'll tell Sandy to lighten up on you this year."

Jamie beamed. "Thanks, Jack."

"Now," Jack grinned mischievously, "let's have a little fun!"

A snowball smacked Jamie right on the forehead, knocking his hat off and over the railing. The moment Jamie noticed, he looked over the rail in horror.

"Jack!"

"What? I was doing you a favor! That thing was hideous. Why do they even make things that shade of puke, anyway?"

Jamie laughed. "You got me, there." He popped his hood back up and lunged for Jack, only to get another face full of freezing white powder.

Unbeknownst to the two of them, the loss of Jamie's hat would have stronger repercussions than they ever imagined. The hat floated on the surface for scarcely a minute before the sharp point of a triton struck it, dragging it beneath the waves into the cold, dark depths of the sea.


	3. Ch3 - In Which Sea Monsters Exist

CHAPTER THREE

"In Which Sea Monsters Exist"

Thirty minutes later, cold, exhausted from play and laughing until his sides were sore, Jamie flopped his onto his back on the deck.

"That was a blast!"

Jack leaned over him. "Well, I am the Guardian of Fun."

Jamie could only shake his head and laugh weekly as Jack pulled him to his feet. He looked around at the deck and whistled low. The ship was covered in snow! Jagged icicles ringed the railings encircling the deck and leading down the stairs. The only things unfrozen were the tall smokestacks, which puffed out steady streams of steam clouds.

"Ni-iiice," he said, highly impressed.

"Thanks."

The wind howled across the deck once more, eerily euphonious as it passed through the icicles. Jamie shivered.

"Best get you inside, kid," Jack told him. "Don't want you catching a cold."

Jamie's smile fell. "Don't forget your promise."

"I won't," Jack said. "I'll tell the Big Guy you want to talk to him, too. I'm sure he can spare a few minutes for the boy who helped us beat the Boogeyman." He reached over and ruffled Jamie's hair. Jamie's smile returned.

"Alright. I'll see you later-"

Suddenly, there was the sound of a loud clap of something striking the water. Jamie, thinking there was a pod of whales nearby, rushed to the railing and looked around the water. But he could see nothing.

"What is it, Jamie?"

"I thought I heard something hitting the water. I thought maybe a whale had-"

He didn't have a chance to finish his sentence as the boat rocked violently. Jamie lost his footing on the snow and nearly slipped, but managed to cling to the railing before he hit the deck. Upon glancing down, he saw that the waves were getting higher and more turbulent.

"The water's getting rougher."

Jack looked over and frowned. "That doesn't make any sense," he said. "There's not supposed to be a snowstorm nearby for at least fifty miles, and it wouldn't be so big as to cause all this."

"What about a regular storm?"

"Maybe."

What Jamie didn't know was that Jack had been all around the area before he came to visit Jamie, and his snowstorms were the only weather phenomena taking place. Each one he had extinguished before he left the site so they wouldn't get out of control. There were children on the cruise ships, mothers and fathers on the fishing trolleys whose little ones would be devastated if they lost their parents right before Christmas to a storm at sea. Jack had gone to extremes to make sure there was plenty of snow for a White Christmas (the one time of year when he even had North on his side about his snow play) and safe passage for those ocean bound.

No, something else had to be the problem.

He glanced down at Jamie. "You'd better get below deck." Then, he added, teasingly, "You wouldn't want to miss out on North's visit because you were too tired to stay up, now, would you?"

As playful as Jack sounded, however, Jamie was past the age where merely changing the subject would ally his fears. Besides that, however good of an actor Jack could be, his eyes were honest. _Too honest_. Jamie noticed Jack's concern.

"Only if you promise to come back."

Jack smiled. "I'll be as quick as a rabbit." He called to the winds and within moments, he was gone.

Hunger.

That's all the beast felt.

It had been years since he last feasted upon a human's flesh, savored the taste of their fear and panic as he consumed them. The best part was, once they had been swallowed whole, they would be deposited into his stomach, an acidic lake with only a thin strips of tumor-ridden flesh rising out as places to rest and walk. Most of these sank when fresh seawater flooded the inside, so eventually, nearly everyone consigned to his stomach would eventually be lost to that acidic lake. The ones that tried to survive in the iridescent glow of the strange bacteria that lined the walls of his gastro-intestinal tract would eventually go mad from lack of sleep and potable water. Few ever escaped.

He had been called many things in his time. Sailors were always coming up with new names for him. At least they did, before the age of modern technology and disbelief in the so-called mythical terrors of the deep. Those that wrote off rogue waves as aftershocks of hurricanes or earthquakes so far seaborne that no one managed to record them.

But "logical" explanation could never destroy what he was, nor had ever stopped the devastation he wracked. Just as nothing could ever satisfy his need for human flesh.

Oh, but how he longed for the days of old, when sailors still believed in him! To see the terror on their faces as he rose up from the deep, the delicious cries to God and mother in every language known of sea-bound men. When he could take his fill of both evil and innocent alike without consequences.

Yes, how sweet the taste of the cabin boy, the captain's child, the immigrant girl as their hopes and dreams disappeared in the whirlpool of water that was his gaping maw…!

However, the Man in the Moon had stayed his feasting many years ago. How could he ever have known that those two defiant young eyes who stared up at him from the ship that day would be chosen as his earthly bane?

_That accursed Davy Jones_, he thought. _How I would love to feel the despair of that one sinking into my flesh, nourishing my body for all those that Man in the Moon loves!_

However, Manny couldn't stop him from killing entirely. Innocent or evil, male or female, young or old, if a human was marked for by the sea, only death awaited. Be it in his stomach or by simply drowning, he or she would die. It was a two-edged sword, the day Davy Jones was created to be his foil.

It seemed almost...ironic, really. Though more ships survived and few believed in him, he still had the chance now and then to flip the metaphorical bird at his sky-bound nemesis.

So when Davy Jones speared the hat of a young boy beloved by the Guardians, the sweet ambrosia that was vengeance was finally in sight.


	4. Ch4 - Whirlpools and Broken Glass

CHAPTER FOUR

"Whirlpools and Broken Glass"

The winds carried Jack fast toward the source of the waves. He expected the feel the gusts pick up violently at any time, to see Manny's light pale against gathering clouds, and to be pelted with either sleet or rain. Instead of a squall, however, Jack saw something that so shocking that he nearly dropped his staff.

It was a whirlpool.

"What on earth...?"

Even before he became a Guardian, Jack had flown that route hundreds of times. Never in his 300-plus years had there been a whirlpool there! Not just any whirlpool: this one was so huge that it was Charybdis incarnate.

Had there been an earthquake? What could have caused the currents to change and become such an enormous, spinning deathtrap?

That's when he noticed something else: all of the icebergs.

There were tons of them! Big ones, small ones, little ice floes- they were all being gathered into the whirlpool, but they weren't sinking to the bottom. Instead, they bobbed around like bath toys in a tub.

_Or teeth in a monster's maw_, Jack thought. Indeed, in the moonlight, the lowered icebergs look like jagged teeth, ready to rip anything to shreds.

And they were all just out of sight of a ship.

"Jamie!" Jack turned around. The winds shifted and he raced back toward the ship.

Jamie was on the snow-covered deck where Jack had left him. When he dropped down onto the deck, he knew Jamie could see something was up.

"What's wrong?"

"Jamie," Jack took him by the shoulders, "you need to go get the captain. There's a whirlpool up ahead."

If Jamie's eyes could have widened any more, Jack swore they would have popped out of his head. "_What?!_"

"I've been through here a thousand times, and never has there been a whirlpool," Jack tried to keep his voice calm and even. It wasn't working as well as he had hoped. "If there was, I would have told you, or made sure ships couldn't come through here at all. Now, there's one not fifteen miles up ahead. You've got to go warn the captain."

Jamie could only stare incredulously at this.

"Are you serious?"

"Would I lie about something like this?"

Jamie shook his head. Jack was a prankster, but danger of this sort? It would have been too out of character for him to make up a story like that.

"But how will I...?"

Jack looked around, scanning the ship, trying to think of something. Suddenly, his face lit up.

"The captains on other ships can talk to each other, right?"

Jamie nodded.

"Then go tell them that the captain of another cruise ship sent word there's trouble."

"But-"

"You find the captain, and I'll take care of the rest."

Jamie nodded and, after telling Jack where the ship's helm was, took off as fast as he could, slipping and even falling on his rear once, to get below deck. Jack, meanwhile, sped off in the direction Jamie pointed out.

He found the room soon enough: a neat little cabin nestled in the bow, a large glass making a visor for the ship. The assistant captain was at the helm, but he didn't seem to have a care in the world. At the moment, he was chatting leisurely with someone on the ship's phone, now and then glancing at the digital reading of coordinates on a red-lit marquee overhead.

_How am I going to get him out of there...?_ Jack though. He pounded on the windows, shouting. Of course, as expected, that hardly worked. Jack looked at the glass. It was thick with a greenish-blue tint made to reflect some of the sun's rays.

Nevertheless, glass was glass, no matter how reinforced. If something struck a weak point hard enough...

He made a ledge of ice on the side of the ship to stand on, knowing he couldn't concentrate on the winds to keep him afloat as well as what he was about to do. He took his staff in both hands and, concentrating, tapped in against the window.

The frost spread slowly at first, curling outward in fernlike tendrils over the glass. The assistant captain never noticed, having turned his back to the window, safe in the knowledge that there were no icebergs looming on the horizon. The frost covered the windows over. Thickened. Jack strengthened his grip and pushed harder against the glass. The winds picked up and it began to snow harder, with any landing near the bow collecting and solidifying into a perfect sheet of liquid crystal. Jack could feel the glass hardening beneath the pressure, weakening as it reached temperatures it was never supposed to endure.

When he felt he had done enough, Jack stepped back into the air jets and summoned a ball of ice, tossed it up, and swung his staff.

The glass was supposed to be shatterproof.

It _wasn't_ Jack Frost-proof.

The ice ball struck the window so hard that it imbedded itself into the back wall of the cabin. Glass shards encased and weighted down by ice tumbled to the water below and littered the control panel and floor in sparkling crystals. The assistant captain, who had hung up the phone and had just been about to step out of the room for a drink, nearly wet himself as a horrible crash resounded through the cabin.

A flurry of very colorful vocabulary words streamed forth as he raced from the room.

Jack clicked his tongue as he admired his handiwork.

"Too easy."

He let the winds sweep after some of the glass before he somersaulted over the control panel. He cracked his knuckles.

"Now to get to work..."


	5. Ch5 - Battle At Sea

CHAPTER FIVE

"Battle At Sea"

When Jamie entered his room, Monty was already awake.

"Jamie!" Monty leaped from the bed and tackled him in a hug. "Where were you? The ship's rocking so hard and Uncle Preston came back and you weren't here and- why are you so cold?" Monty's eyes widened. "You were outside? You know we aren't supposed to be out on deck at night! What if you fell overbo-"

Jamie grabbed Monty by the shoulders and held him out at arms-length.

"Monty, listen to me," he said, his eyes boring holes into his friend's. "I just saw Jack."

Monty's face contorted into confusion.

"Jack? As in, Jack Frost? He's here and you didn't tell me? Not cool, Jamie!"

Jamie shook him.

"Shut up for a minute!"

Monty's eyes widened. Jamie never talked to him like that! He was already pale, likely from being afraid of the violent waves rocking the ship. Upon hearing Jamie so serious, however, his skin seemed to turn almost translucent from lack of blood.

"I need to find the captain. Where did your uncle go?"

"H-he went looking for you!"

"Didn't he say where?"

"No-"

The door flew open.

"Captain Preston! There's-huh?" Jamie turned and looked up to see the assistant captain, visibly shaken and almost as pale as Monty. The man looked down at him. "Boys, where's the captain?"

"He went looking for Jamie," Monty said.

"But isn't Jamie right here?" the man said. He shook his head. "Never mind! Where is he now?"

"Matthers?"

Jamie heard the captain's voice distant and coming closer.

"What are you doing here?"

"Captain, you're not going to believe this! I was at the helm and the window- it just shattered!"

"What?"

"It's true! I was about to leave to get a drink when then entire then just fell into shards! There's glass everywhere!"

The captain swore and stomped back up the hall, the assistant captain hot on his heels. When they were gone, Monty looked at Jamie expectantly. Jamie simply told him to get his clothes on, and then tossed him a lifejacket from the wardrobe. Monty gawked at Jamie, then at the orange-covered inflatable foam, then back to Jamie. Jamie shrugged off his jacket so he could put the vest on underneath it.

"Just in case," Jamie said.

_When Jack said he'd take care of everything, he meant it!_

Jamie looked around at the mess littering the floor of the cabin. Bits of ice mingled with the frozen glass, and the room was bitterly cold from the wind. The captain clenched a paper printout in his hand tightly as he bellowed into the walkie-talkie mic at the control panel. Monty rubbed his arms beside him, trying to keep warm.

"...For Christssake, can anyone out there hear me?"

"What's going on?" Jamie asked innocently.

The captain slammed the mic onto the panel. "I can't get anyone on the horn. Matthers, send a warning to the _Destiny_ behind us. We're changing course. This had better not be a prank, or I'll have someone's job for this-" When he turned around, he noticed the boys. "Boys, what are you doing here? And Bennet, what have I told you about going out onto the ship at night?"

His eyes narrowed on the strip of orange peeping above Monty's coat.

"Ur, Monty was worried about the ship rocking," Jamie lied. Monty shot him a look but Jamie ignored it.

Suddenly, blasts from the air horn roared out into the night. Jamie clamped his hands over his ears as the captain ushered them both out into the hallway.

Within what seemed like a moments, Jamie was standing on deck, Monty practically joined to his side, as a few brave souls scampered onto deck, wondering about the commotion. Everyone pelted questions at his neighbor, but no one knew the cause for the air horn blasts. Jamie pulled Monty away from the crowd.

"Would you please tell me what is going on?"

"Jack spotted a whirlpool," Jamie told him quietly enough so no one could hear. He capped his hand over Monty's mouth when the boy almost shouted in terror. "Quiet! Do you want everyone to panic?"

Monty shook his head. After receiving a nod of promise that he wouldn't spill his guts to anyone, Jamie removed his hand.

"But there shouldn't be any whirlpools around here!" Monty protested. Jamie gave him a pointed look.

"You looked that up before we got on here?"

Monty's face darkened with embarrassment. "Of course, I did!" It took Jamie aback at how frightened his friend was. _That last trip must really have scared him for him to research chances of something like that,_ he reasoned. "But big ships usually don't have to worry about that. They can pass right through unharmed."

"Yes, well, apparently, this one was big enough to freak out Jack Frost."

"You sure he's not playing a prank?"

Jamie scowled. Monty got the message.

Now all they could do was stand on deck, shivering in the cold, and wait.

Jack Frost wasn't having as leisurely a time as Jamie. The moment he finished the fake message and frying the exterior communications systems with ice, he flew back to the whirlpool. Now, he was doing his best attempt at "Whack-A-Floe". Even if the ship's captain decided to sail through the whirlpool, the rows of teeth-like icebergs would tear through its hull as his ice ball had that window.

The icebergs themselves were easy enough to destroy. A little work with his staff and even the largest crumbled into snow, scattering about the winds and sea like confetti. What was troubling is where they all came from.

_I know they weren't here a few hours ago, and there is no way this many could have made it this far in that short amount of time_.

He knew there had to be another explanation. Besides, why were the floes just circling instead of going underwater?

Jack was halfway through his iceberg deformation when he got his answer.

An answer in the form of something flying by his head.

"What in the heck?"

He turned and watched the shadow disappear on the other side of the whirlpool. Jack took cover on one particularly large iceberg, thankful for the full moonlight illuminating the ice. Suddenly, two more projectiles burst from the water. He flipped upwards, letting them lodge firmly in the ice below him. What he landed on were the shafts of two-

"Harpoons?"

No sooner was the word out of his mouth than he was assailed from all sides. Jack slammed his staff downward into the iceberg, causing the ice around him to fan out in a shield. The harpoons pinged the sides, leaving Jack shortly encased in what looked like a very odd sea urchin.

_Where are they coming from?_ He noticed the harpoons were of all different styles. Some broken. Some half-rotted. Other were fashioned from various materials that he was sure didn't belong in normal harpoons. The one closest to him, in fact, was water piping affixed with a rusted switchblade.

The iceberg exploded, sending harpoons shooting in all directions and snow flying everywhere. Using a miniature hurricane of flurries to cover his movements, he quickly dispatched the largest of the icebergs and darted out of the vortex- his ascent spurred on by even more projectiles.

"This is bad," he said, looking back at the water when he was up high enough for nothing to hit him. He noticed several shadows pop out of the water. He took aim and blasted the center of them. The ice struck several, sending the rest diving with high-pitched shrieks. He couldn't tell what the creatures were from that high up, but as they bobbed in the water, he could swear they almost looked...human.

As bad as things looked, they shortly became much worse. For within moments of the other shadows disappearing, the vortex inverted-

_Sending every iceberg straight for Jack._


	6. ch6 - Wherein Jamie Takes a Swan Dive

CHAPTER SIX

"Wherein Jamie Takes a Swan Dive"

"Are those fireworks?"

Jamie looked out over the ocean to where Monty was pointing. The flashes of blue and white weren't fireworks, though. It was Jack Frost's magic!

_What is going on? Is Jack fighting something?_ Fear coiled in the pit of Jamie's stomach. Maybe the whirlpool wasn't the only threat.

Maybe...something unnatural caused it.

His mind raced with the possibilities. Could the Boogeyman have returned? No, that didn't seem quite right. There was something definitely going on, though, and Jack Frost was in the middle of it.

"Jamie? What's going on?"

"I don't know..." Jamie trailed off. "I don't have a good feeling about it, though."

"L-look," Monty said. "We'd better go back inside. We don't want to stay up here-"

"I'm not going."

Monty gaped. "What?"

"You heard me."

"Jamie, that's crazy talk! You can't stay up here! You said it yourself: that whirlpool freaked out Jack Frost."

Jamie turned on him. "Yes, but now he's fighting-" he glanced back out toward the horizon. The lightshow had ended. "-whatever that is!"

"But there's nothing you can do up here, either! Look, let's get back below deck. Uncle Preston's changing course, so we'll be alright. But if he catches us out here after you left, we're going to be in big trouble!"

Monty was practically green with seasickness and trembling with fear as the ship rocked in the rough waters, which were growing rougher by the second. Normally, Jamie would have comforted his scared friend. Right now, however, it felt more important for Jamie to see what was happening. He didn't know of a way he could help, but for Pete's sake, he couldn't just hunker down inside while one of his good friends was fighting for possibly all their lives!

"Monty…"

Monty tugged on his arm. Jamie tried to shake him off.

"Let's go!"

"I said no-"

The ship lurched.

Jamie sailed backwards, his head smacking the railing as he went down. His body continued to skid. He barely registered the look of horror on Monty's face as the world fell out from under him.

Jack arrived just in time to see Monty scramble over to the railing and start screaming his head off.

"Jamie! _JAMIE!_"

Monty shouted to someone to get help, but there was so much chaos going on aboard that Jack doubted anyone heard him.

Jack vaguely saw a man nearly tumble over the side of the ship. A slight woman in a housekeeper's uniform dove for the base of an upper deck and caught a little girl before she hit the ground. A crewman's legs swung outward as he kept an iron grip on the frostbite-generating railing.

However, Jack's mind had only one thought:

_Save Jamie._

He dove down to the water, searching the surface for any sign of life. Fortunately, not long after Jamie went under, he resurfaced. Letting out a breath he didn't know he was holding, Jack yanked the boy out of the water by his hood and tossed him onto a hastily made ice floe.

"Jamie Bennet," Jack said, "don't you know better than to take a swan dive off the side of a ship into freezing cold water?"

Jamie's teeth were chattering too hard for him to respond. He saw Monty looking back over the side of the ship again and waved. Monty smiled wearily and waved before staggering back from the railing. Jack eyed the water around them warily, and then looked back down to Jamie.

"Let's get you back on the ship."

He picked up the boy and flew up the side of the ship, depositing him discreetly on the highest deck where they had played earlier.

"J-j-j-jack...wh-what hap-p-p-ppened out there?"

Jack just grinned.

"Me solving the problem," he said. "How much longer did you say this cruise was?"

"It's-s-s over at-t-t six th-this m-m-m-morning."

_Less than five hours._ Jack nodded. "Alright, you get below deck. I'll stick around...you know," he winked, "in case you decide to take anymore midnight dips."

Jamie shook his head and, rubbing his numbed arms, made his way slowly down to the main deck.

Slipping through the water as silently and easily as a hot knife through butter, the woman made her way to a small iceberg jutting out well above the water and climbed onto it. As she hauled herself up from the water, her long tail sloughing off in slimy goo like rotted seaweed and leaving behind a pair of strong legs encased in breeches and knee-high boots. She took only a moment to straighten the dripping Shakespearean blouse and belt before standing. She vaguely noticed the familiar shapes of her waterborne helpers slipping through the water toward her.

She watched as the cruise ship safely drifted away into the night.

She tugged out her necklace, a thin chain with a long rusty key dangling from it. Her hand clamped around the stick of a blade and held it out from herself. The chain and key flashed a brilliant sea green. Then the chain was gone, and the key had elongated itself instantaneously into a triton.

"Looks like the hunt is on."


	7. Ch7 - North's History Lesson

CHAPTER SEVEN

"North's History Lesson"

Nicholas St. North was not a happy man when he discovered that half the areas Jack Frost promised to cover in snow remained unfinished. He was fully prepared to give a very loud lecture to the youngest Guardian about responsibility and keeping promises when Jack came through the door that morning, utterly exhausted and smelling of seawater.

"What has happened?" Jack slumped into a chair between two yetis as North called for a blanket and cookies.

"Let me just ask this: has there been any sign of Pitch Black?"

North nearly dropped the tray of cookies he'd plucked from an elf. "The Boogeyman? Why you mention him?"

"Just tell me already," Jack scowled at North. "I had a really long night and I need to know."

North raised a bushy eyebrow. "No, Boogeyman has not troubled us since we defeated him," he pushed the plate toward Jack, who weakly waved the tray away. "I would feel it if he did. In my-"

"-Belly. Yeah, yeah," Jack said. Groaning, he leaned forward and wiped his hands over his face. "Then we have another problem."

North sat the cookies aside and pulled up a chair, sitting on it backwards so he could cross his arms over the top. Jack explained the events of that early morning, and he could see the Guardian of Wonder's eyes growing more concerned. By the end of his tale, Jack felt more worn than he had during the actual battle.

"You say this happen at sea?"

Jack snorted. "Well, it certainly didn't happen in a bathtub."

"No need for being smarty-pants." North stood up.

"What? You know something about this?"

North crossed his hands behind his back and looked away. "I admit...it does sound familiar." He glanced toward Jack and waved him to follow. "We go to office. Finish talk there."

North pulled an old book from his desk. He tossed it in Jack's lap, and then settled himself into his own chair.

"What's this?"

"Have you ever heard tale of Davy Jones?"

Jack looked at North, puzzled. "As in 'Davy Jones' locker'? Yeah, who hasn't?"

"It might surprise you," North linked his fingers together, "that tale is not tall tale."

"I don't follow."

North gestured for him to open the book. Jack flipped it open and turned through the pages. He quickly realized it was less of a textbook than a photo album. There were pictures of the Man in the Moon and the Guardians, Pitch Black, and a few spirits he vaguely recognized-the Groundhog and the Leprechaun, among others. Then there were sketches and photos of demons he recognized only from stories North told him (including a very hideous picture of an old witch named Baba Yaga, which was so realistic that Jack had to turn the page to stop the shivers running down his spine).

Finally, he turned to a page with a single sketch and a simple caption:

"'Davy Jones, Keeper of the Deep'," he looked up at North. "Davy Jones is real?"

North nodded. "A spirit like you and I, made by Man in Moon many years ago. You ever heard of Jonah and big fish?"

"Yes, but what does that have to do with Davy Jones?"

"Years ago, many demons walked earth. Horrible demons. They slay men, women, _children_," North emphasized with disgust, "for no reason other than to feed endless craving for evil. They were here before Manny, and he was not able to destroy them. Instead, he create spirits to control them. To protect-"

"-Children. Yeah, yeah, I-"

North, one eyebrow raised, looked at Jack warningly. Jack cleared his throat nervously.

"Sorry. Continue?"

"As I was saying," North said, raising a hand to gesture towards the sky, "Man in Moon choose spirits to protect children." He propped his elbows on the desk and leaned into his linked hands. "But sometimes," North said sadly, "in ways that not even Man in Moon wish he must."

"Like with fear and allowing Pitch to survive?"

"Yes," North nodded, "and worse."

Jack crossed his arms over himself, awaiting the explanation. He had seen North sad before, but the sorrow in those eyes, usually full of wonder, that put Jack on edge.

"There was once great demon who roamed ocean."

_So I guess Jamie's question has an answer: sea monsters exist._ "Yeah?"

"He called by many names, but name we know him by is Leviathan."

Jack waved his hands in front of himself. "Wait a minute...the Leviathan? That thing's real?" Vaguely, he recalled hearing sailors speak of an enormous sea monster, but he figured it was just superstition. After all, Jack hadn't seen anything of the sort in his three hundred-plus years.

"Yes, Jack Frost. Leviathan is real. Real _demon_. For centuries, he roam waters unchecked, attack any ship he please. He swallow man whole, feed on their terror and despair. He take so many ships that people fear sea monster attack at any time. Many time, he did so, leaving only single survivor to tell tale."

"So what happened to him?"

"One day, Manny make new spirit: Davy Jones. Davy Jones fight Leviathan. In end, Leviathan try to flee back to Hell, but Hell would not open for him. Instead, he was forced to bargain with Davy Jones. Souls marked for sea still die. But now they can die peacefully, not live forever in torment as part of Leviathan."

"In Davy Jones' locker," Jack felt the bile rising in his throat. "That's terrible."

North nodded. "Is terrible, but," he said, and then held up a finger, "is necessary evil. When Jones fight, many ships escape. Less people believe in sea monster. Leviathan unable to do evil unchecked."

Jack hopped out of his chair. "But people still die, North! They die on the seas even today."

"And Davy Jones keeps those who would live alive and the innocent untouched by Leviathan-"

Jack slammed his hands down on North's desk, glowering, his face so close to the older Guardian's that he could have bitten off an eyebrow, had he been any angrier.

"There were children," Jack said lowly, "on that ship. I spent half a night busting icebergs spinning around in a whirlpool that came from out of nowhere and trying not to wind up a Guardian porcupine from all the harpoons thrown at me from Manny-Knows-What was down there. Not to mention nearly losing Jamie Bennet to an accidental swan dive into the Pacific Ocean."

North's eyes narrowed at him.

"I don't care if the Man in the Moon thought it would be better to make this Davy Jones character to start some grotesque balance in deaths at sea. But believers or not, if I hadn't been there, that ship would have been chopped up in an iceberg blender!"

Jack shoved himself away from the desk and took up his staff.

"You told me that the Guardians protect children," he said darkly. "It's hard to protect children when you're letting a demon and a corrupt spirit drown them. See you later, North."

Before North could say another word, Jack marched smartly out of the office, slamming the door behind him.

Out again in the open air, Jack took to the skies as fast as the wind could carry him. He wanted to see Jamie, the first kid to believe in him. He wanted to look into his face and tell himself that he would never let the Leviathan touch him or another child ever again.

_Davy Jones, I don't know who you are, but you're no longer needed. So long as Jack Frost exists, the Leviathan will never make a meal of another child. I swear it!_


	8. Ch8 - Jack Tells Jamie About Davy Jones

CHAPTER EIGHT

"Jack Tells Jamie About Davy Jones"

Jamie was, undoubtedly, happy to be back on dry land. He explained away his wet clothes by having fallen into a fountain in the ship's lobby (considering no one but Monty saw him go overboard, there was no reason not to believe him). He refused to sleep until he was safely at Monty's aunt and uncle's house, which was- thankfully -out in the frostbitten section of the local woodland. By the time he managed to crawl into a bed safely away from the ocean, he had gone without sleep for nearly two days.

Late the second morning after his adventure, Jamie was out in the yard, making a snowman with Monty and his cousins. The cousins, girls aged three and five, tired of the cold soon enough and ran back inside. Monty stayed to talk with Jamie.

"Have you had a chance to talk to Jack?"

"No," Jamie said. "Here, give me a boost." Monty offered his hand for a foothold so Jamie could give the snowman his wardrobe. "Mr. Snowlo needs a mustache...there!" He stepped down and admired the bits of stringy lichen that made up the snowman's facial hair. "I haven't had any dreams lately either, so I'm guessing Sandy's taking a vacation."

Monty stuffed a branch arm into the side of the snowman. "You don't think the Boogeyman's come back, do you?"

"No," Jamie added the other arm, "it doesn't feel like Pitch. There's a...I don't know. It feels like a different type of scary. I'm not sure how to explain it. Kinda like...like this crushing feeling on your chest? Like-"

"Drowning?"

Jamie nodded. "Yeah, but don't mention that to Jack."

"Got'cha."

Monty turned back to the snowman. Jack had told them about his past a little while after Pitch's defeat. Ever since, it had been an unofficial rule to avoid the "D" word to the Guardian of Fun.

After putting the finishing touches on the snowman, Monty asked Jamie, "Do you think he'll show up tonight?"

"Maybe, if North doesn't have him helping out with something."

"I just hope he does before vacation ends," Monty said. "I don't want to end my vacation with the image of my best friend going overboard as the biggest thought in my head."

Jamie chuckled. "Nah, you'll forget all about that. Don't you remember? Christmas Eve is almost here!"

The room Jamie shared with Monty was different, but since there was a window, it didn't matter. He turned away from his book the moment he heard the soft pecking on the glass. Jack waved to him.

"About time," Jamie said, throwing up the window. Jack slipped into the room. "What took you?"

"I was having a talk with North," he told Jamie. Jamie raised an eyebrow.

"Did you find out anything about the whirlpool?"

_More than I wanted to_. Jack sighed. How was he supposed to explain to Jamie about Davy Jones? After all, the Man in the Moon made him. _Made him to lead children to their deaths in a morbid tug-of-war with a demon fish._ He swallowed thickly, hoping Jamie wouldn't notice.

"Just do me a favor and stay away from the ocean for a while, alright?"

"Why?"

Jack looked at Jamie. A kid. _His_ kid. The first child to believe in him. If that didn't bring out the papa wolf genes in Jack, nothing could.

_I'd rather tell him later than sooner._

Jack smiled deceptively. "Isn't one swan dive off the side of a ship per year enough?"

"Very funny." Jamie hopped back onto his bed. "What's really going on? You told me there was a whirlpool, but we never ran into it. Don't say it was a joke, either. I saw your magic out across the ocean." He crossed his arms over his chest. "What happened out there, Jack?"

Jack looked long and hard at the boy for several moments, wrestling over the idea of what part of the story, if any, he should tell Jamie. The boy still believed in him. He was even talking to the Man in the Moon right before Jack found the ship. If he told him that Manny created a spirit that would lead children to watery deaths, would that squash part of Jamie's childhood innocence? Enough to make him stop believing in anything MiM had to do with?

_Including me?_

"Just tell me, Jack," Jamie said. "You owe me."

The words stung him. Yes, Jack owed Jamie. Owed him for children's very belief in Jack Frost.

"Alright," Jack sat down at the foot of the bed. Jamie scooted next to him.

Against all logical reasoning- for both his own sake and Jamie's sanity - Jack told the whole story: the whirlpool, the distraction at the ship, and his battle at sea. The talk with North was the hardest and took the longest to tell. Throughout the talk, Jack tried not to look in Jamie's direction, knowing that if he did, he'd cave and try to pass off the whole thing as a joke. Even when he had finished the story, it was several long moments before Jack was willing to look Jamie in the eye.

"Jack?"

"Yeah?" he said, still staring at the wall in front of him.

"Look at me."

The Guardian of Fun took a deep breath and looked beside him. Instead of fear or disbelief, he saw understanding in Jamie's brown eyes. Jack didn't get it but he was a bit relieved.

"You said the Man in the Moon made Davy Jones to keep a demon from getting people at sea, even if it meant they died anyway?"

"That's what North told me."

Jamie looked down at his lap and picked at a loose string on his pajamas. "I can kinda understand." Jack looked at him, bewildered.

"How?"

Jamie took in a deep breath, and then looked over at the wall. "Remember when you said you drowned after saving your sister?"

Jack nodded. It wasn't one of his favorite memories, but losing his life meant his sister had survived.

"Yeah."

"Well, what if you had been on the ocean instead? Instead of Manny turning you into a spirit, what if you had the choice between become some demon's lunch and just, um, going to sleep? What if it had been your sister instead of you?"

Jack was silent for several moments. He hadn't thought of that.

"It's bad that anyone had to die like that. Still...I wonder how Davy Jones feels about it."

"What do you mean?"

"Think about Pitch Black for a minute. He wanted to be believed in, but all he could do was make people afraid. However, he was a spirit like you guys for a reason, too, even if it seems like a bad one." Jamie turned and looked directly at Jack. "How much worse would it be not only being not believed in, but your only reason for existence was to let someone drown so a demon wouldn't eat them?"

Finally, Jack nodded. "I think I see your point."

"Maybe you should go talk to Davy Jones? Maybe he could use a friend."

"Heh, and wind up a pincushion for his harpoons?" Jack stood, grinning. His grin soon morphed into a genuine smile. "Alright, I'll see if I can find this Jones person. But if I wind up a Guardian hedgehog, I am blaming you!"

Jamie grinned. "I thought it was a porcupine?"

"Details, schmetails," Jack shrugged, slipping out of the window. "See you later, kid."


	9. Ch9 - Davy Jones Prepares For Battle

CHAPTER NINE

"Davy Jones Prepares For Battle"

It was hard enough to fight the Leviathan on her own turf, but venturing onto dry land was another story.

Davy Jones turned to look at her compatriots. Several selkies walked in formation behind her. With shed skins bound around their hips or fashioned into togas, they looked like humans. Each one carried a harpoon. Davy herself had added a dagger to her person this night.

She hated her job. Hated the reason why the big MiM gave it to her. What joy was there in seeing the faces of the drowning? Sure, there would often be a look of peace as they succumbed to the gentle caresses of her selkies and the lullabies of her sirens, and she would know their souls rested peacefully, untainted, and free from the Leviathan's maw.

But a child freed from the Leviathan was still a dead child.

It was why her hatred of the Leviathan outweighed her occupational depression. She wouldn't let him have an innocent marked soul no matter what. Especially a child.

"It won't be long now," she said. "I can feel it."

The three other marked who had survived that night were already dead. Davy Jones and her crew never killed a mortal, but they never stopped a death, either. They could not. The Man in the Moon had never told her how or why she couldn't, and she didn't know if there actually was a way. Not that she hadn't tried, mind you. In addition, the sea only told her where the next was marked.

All she knew was that land was no safe haven, for where she and her selkies could go, so, too, could the minions of the Leviathan: the kelpies.

_Those wretched abominations wishing they were horses!_ Davy thought. The kelpies were horrible, gruesome creatures. Part horse, part spiny eel or seahorse (Davy never knew which. She could do without having to look at those monsters more than she had to), they could tread waterways with as much ease as a real horse could an open pasture.

They also had a thirst for blood outdone only by their master.

Davy had been too late for two of the marked. She found the remains of a sailor under a pier and a middle-aged businessman in an alley not far from a seedy bar. From the obvious bodily desecration caused by the kelpies, Davy was glad they wouldn't be missed. Criminals both. Both would easily be written off as victims of human crimes.

Both Davy would have relished causing had she still been alive, knowing that the kelpies were spawned from bits of damned souls and only certain inhumane crimes would make them so wild with bloodlust.

But Davy fought for the third. She was a simple ship housekeeper, in her late twenties. No children but she would have made and excellent mother, the way she leapt into action that night and prevented that little girl from hitting the deck. Davy knew the woman longed for death. Davy didn't know why, but she didn't question it.

Davy saw her jump from the bridge to the awaiting, unseen kelpies below. Davy couldn't stop the death, but there were five less kelpies in the world to serve the Leviathan.

Now, there only one marked soul remained.

It pained her, knowing that the marked was so young. He would never get to experience the joys and sorrows in life that had been denied Davy, as she perished at such a youthful age.

Still, it would be unthinkable to allow the kelpies to drag him back to sea.

For now, she had to concentrate on beating the kelpies to the punch.


	10. Ch10 - Cornered By The Kelpies

CHAPTER TEN

"Cornered By The Kelpies"

Jack had stopped at a nearby frozen river, hoping thickening the ice would give him a chance to sort out his thoughts, when his hair stood on end. He whirled around, looking in every direction for danger, but he could find nothing.

He waited.

And waited.

And waited some more.

Beads of sweat trickled down his face. _Something is here, I just know it!_

Suddenly, he sprang into the air. A split-second later, the frozen river below him shattered and fifteen great hulking beasts emerged.

When he heard the whinny of horses and saw the sprightly legs kicking their way toward the night sky, Jack swore the Boogeyman and his Nightmares had returned.

However, there were a few things wrong with that picture:

One- these horses were far more solid than anything Sandy's stolen dreamsand could ever construct,

Two- they were the color of rotted seaweed and smelled like stagnant water,

and Three- Nightmares didn't have seahorse tails.

The mutated beasts raged off into the night, their tails drawn upward so that they ran on their two front (and only) legs. Jack could only gawk, bewildered, as they headed off in the direction of the house.

Jamie had just about dozed off when he heard the signs of a scuffle and howling winds outside his window. He rolled out of bed and stumbled over to the window to see Jack Frost in the yard, facing down a menacing herd of half-horse monsters. He threw up the window and shouted.

"Jack?!"

The Guardian whirled his staff around and sent one frosted horse-thing keening across the yard. "Jamie! Ge-"

Before Jack could finish his sentence, one of the monsters sprang up, its rows of horse-like teeth suddenly elongating into those of a piranha, its jaws snapping wildly as it rushed toward Jamie. Jamie screamed and slammed the window shut. The horse-thing slammed into the window, and then plummeted to the ground. Jamie glanced down to see the monster quickly become a statue of ice before shattering from one deft snap of Jack's staff.

The eleven-year-old took a few steps back, dazed at what he had just seen. Then it hit him:

_Jack's in trouble!_

He turned and looked at Monty. The sleeping boy lay curled tightly in his blankets, his face still a bit pale from a stomachache he had had earlier. His aunt thought he had caught a virus. Jamie believed the likelier cause was the five large sugar cookies Monty snuck after supper.

Regardless, Monty would be useless fighting sick. Jamie left him alone, pausing only long enough to grab a baseball bat from the closet, and headed out of the bedroom.

The battle was in full swing when Jamie opened the patio doors. Nine horse-things were statues in the backyard, another shattered into broken bits of monster and ice. Jack was holding off the last four, which were now standing on their seahorse-like tails and rearing up with their legs like some sort of mutated prawns.

Jamie raced out into the snow as Jack attempted to take down one of the beasts. A second reared up to kick him. Jamie scooped up a handful of snow and chunked it. It broke over the monster's jaw in a burst of flurries.

"Get away from Jack Frost!"

Jack froze the horse-monster's upper body and watched it fall back into the snow, the tail curling up- making it resemble an icy kelpie tempura. He heard Jamie shout and whirled around to see the boy defiantly wielding a baseball bat against one of the terrible beasts.

_He shouldn't be out here!_

Scarcely had the thought formed in his head when three kelpies were on him, kicking and gnashing their razor-sharp teeth. Jack saw bits of ice clinging to one's fur. The others must have stomped the ice until he was free.

With three kelpies bearing down on him, all Jack could do was fight.

"Jamie! Get in the house!"

An errant hoof sent Jack flying across the yard. Jamie screamed. The Guardian slammed into a tree and brought a curtain of snow down around himself. The second he got his bearings, Jack knew he was in trouble.

His staff wasn't in his hands.

Panic set in. All four of the remaining kelpies had Jamie surrounded. They were staring at him, shaking their seaweed-tangled manes and whinnying loudly. But they weren't attacking. Not yet.

Jack didn't stop to think why. He took off across the yard, running, half-stumbling, shouting and waving his hands to get their attention.

They didn't notice.

Neither did Jamie.

Jamie looked up into the dark eyes of the kelpie. Moments before, they were soulless and frightening. Now, they were suddenly kind, exuding a soothing calm the likes of which he never felt before. The piranha teeth and seahorse tails didn't seem so scary now. The stench of rotten seaweed was...almost sweet. He gazed into the hypnotic stare of one of the great beasts. It was calling to him, begging to be petted, rode, loved…

Jamie reached out a hand.

"No! Jamie!" Jack darted after his staff as one of the kelpies turned away from the circle after him.

_Splat!_

Jamie shook his head.

"Wha...snow?"

He turned around and saw the branches of the tree above him now devoid of snow.

When Jamie looked back, the kelpies' spell was broken. One snapped at him. Jamie brought the bat around in an arc, slamming it into the monster's jaw. It let off a horrible whine, shook its head, and then turned to look at him. It snorted once, its putrid breath forming great clouds of vapor in the bitter cold.

"Oh, boy..."

Jamie screamed as all three of the surrounding kelpies rose up and pawed the air.

Jack threw himself into the snow, both hands reaching for his staff as the one kelpie bounded through the drifts like a sheepdog, spraying snow with each heavy lunge. It leaped, planning to crush the Guardian under its enormous weight.

Ice blasted its face.

The kelpie would have screamed if it could. Instead, it staggered back, kicking and shaking its head, unable to see because its eyes were frozen shut. Jack didn't stop to enjoy his work. He fried two more blasts before he got to his feet, taking out two of the kelpies going after Jamie. The third leaped into the air-

Only to fly skyward, upside-down.

Jack laughed, relieved, when he saw the whip send the horse-monster sailing off into a distant grove of evergreens.

"Sandy!"

The little golden man floated down from the edge of the roof, dusting off his hands.

"Boy, am I glad to see you!" Jamie said.

"What are you doing here?" Jack asked. The dreamsand shifted above Sandy's head to a picture of a child holding his stomach, then sleeping peacefully after a spray of sand from Sandy's pictographic counterpart.

"Monty had a stomachache," Jamie told Jack. Jack nodded.

Sandy pointed to the kelpie with the block of ice on its head, a question mark forming over his head.

"I'm not sure," Jack said. "They came out of the river-"

The whoosh of a projectile sang by his head. It slammed into the overturned kelpie with a sickening _thud!_ Jack skidded across the snow, halting just in front of the Sandman, whose stubby arms stretched out in a protective stance before Jamie. Jack's eyes widened when he saw the silenced kelpie.

A single harpoon lay lodged in its flank.


	11. Ch11 - Friend or Foe?

CHAPTER ELEVEN

"Friend Or Foe?"

More harpoons flew from the woods. Those kelpies fully encased in ice shattered into pieces. The others lay unmoving on the ground. Jack readied his staff as Sandy readied his sand whips.

Suddenly, each of the fallen kelpies decomposed, their bodies morphing into patches of rotted seaweed. Jamie gagged and capped a hand over his nose to hide the smell.

"Eww, what _is_ that?"

_I'm more worried about what's in the woods,_ Jack thought. His gaze shifted between the trees, dark skeletal silhouettes against the moonlit blanket of snow.

Slowly, seven shadows lumbered out of the woodland. They looked human, with the exception that no living human in his right mind would be trudging through the Alaskan wilderness at night, wearing nothing but a single animal skin toga.

A question mark flashed over Sandy's head.

Jack didn't know who they were.

"Alright," he waved his staff warningly, "who are you?"

"They are selkies, lad."

The voice had come from just beyond the tree line, but it was so clear and strong that it carried easily over the barren yard. Jack aimed his staff.

"Whoever you are, come out of there," he told the voice. "I have a bone to pick with you over these mutant horses you sent after my pal here!"

"I didn't send them."

Out from behind a large fir stepped a lean figure in a billowing white blouse, dark trousers, and knee-high boots. Dark blue-green hair fell in stringy curls around a youthful, mistrusting face and down to the slight swell of bosom. The woman stepped into full view, her hands on her hips.

"Then who did? And why are they going after this house?"

"Kelpies don't attack houses," the woman said. Jack noticed the soft inflection in her voice, a sort of Irish-British hybrid belonging to sailors who had roamed the seas in previous centuries. "They attack the marked."

"Marked?"

"Aye. Marked."

"Hey, my hat!"

Jack glanced at Jamie and saw him pointing toward the woman. Sure enough, stuffed into the woman's belt with the dagger was the puke-green knitted hat that had been lost to the ocean only a few nights before.

"Why do you have it?" Jamie asked.

"A token of the marked always helps in location."

By now, Jack had all he could take of the strange woman's cryptic nonsense. "Enough riddles," he told her. "I want answers. What's all this "marked" nonsense you're babbling about? Who are these guys?" He waved his staff at her companions. "What are those horse-monsters and who the heck are you?"

She ignored Jack, her gaze trailing to the spirit standing beside him. Her eyes widened.

"By the powers..." Her breath momentarily caught in her throat. "Sanderson Mansnoozie?"

Sandy seemed confused, a flurry of dreamsand images appearing over his head in the form for two stick people talking, followed by several question marks. The woman sighed.

"Yes, we've talked before," she said sadly, "though it were many a year ago. The last time, ye were sending off a wee cap'n's daughter into the realm of Nod. He was a Spaniard, I think. It was a merchant's vessel."

Sandy rubbed his chin for a minute, and then he snapped his fingers and a dreamsand light bulb appeared over his head. He raised his hands and gestured to a flurry of images that appeared and disappeared so fast that Jack couldn't catch them all. Jamie tried anyway.

"Fish? Big fish? Water-no, river? Um, ocean? Yeah, ocean!"

Sandy shook his head. Finally, he summoned up an image of a skull and crossbones, a plus sign, and a box.

"Poison box?" Jack asked. Sandy shook his head.

"Pirate's coffin?" Jamie added.

Sandy face-palmed. This time, the skull and crossbones morphed into a hand, the plus into a combination lock on the box. The dreamsand hand fiddles with the lock for a moment before it popped off, causing books to spill out of the opened box.

"Locker?" Jamie said. Suddenly, his eyes widened. He pointed at the woman.

"Jack, that's Davy Jones!"

"What?"

The woman nodded. "Smart for a wee one, ain't ye?" Jack gawked.

"Davy Jones is a _girl?_"

The woman stepped back and swept her hands outwards, her head cocked to the side as if to say, _Isn't it obvious?_ Jack shook his head and held up one hand.

"Wait, wait, wait...if you're Davy Jones, aren't you supposed to be in the ocean?"

She nodded. "And I will be again, once I've got what I've come for."

"And that is...?"

Davy Jones lifted her hand and pointed. Jack followed the line of her finger.

_She was pointing at Jamie_.


	12. Ch12 - Jack Frost VS Davy Jones

CHAPTER TWELVE

"Jack Frost VS. Davy Jones"

"Me?" Jamie pointed to himself. "What do you want with me?"

"It may sound strange to ye, laddie," Davy Jones said, "but not everyone can see me. Seeing a kelpie, now-" she kicked a bit of rotted seaweed at her feet, "-that be a real bit o' misfortune. They only appear to the marked who've managed to escape the sea." She took a step forward.

"Escaped the sea?"

Davy Jones continued to move forward, her shiny black boots glinting with snow crystals.

"The ship ye were on was supposed to have wrecked. Four were marked by the sea for the Leviathan. For some reason, however," she eyed Jack warily, "the icebergs my selkies and sirens helped me collect were destroyed and the marked escaped their fate. Or they did, for a while."

Another step forward. Davy reached into her blouse and tugged out her neck chain.

"What do you mean?"

"The kelpies got two. The third is at rest. And you, dear wee one..."

Her fingers coiled around the long blade of the key.

"Are the fourth and last."

_I really had hoped to avoid a confrontation_. She glared at Sandy. _You know my job. Why must you interfere?_

"Being an innocent, I can't let the Leviathan have him. Even if I have to beat a Guardian to do it. Sandman," she said, she looked pointedly at Sandy, "I give ye one chance to take your little friend here and get out o' me way. I'll no' ask again."

The Sandman and Jack exchanged glances, and then looked back to the child. They then nodded to one another. Sandy brought one whip back and Jack shifted his feet in the snow.

"I've never hit a woman before," Jack said lowly, leveling his staff at Davy Jones, "but if you touch one hair on Jamie Bennet's head, I'll knock you into next winter."

Sandy conjured dreamsand images of a fist beating into a cupped palm.

Davy's eyes narrowed. Then closed.

"Very well. You were warned."

She knew her selkies were off before the light even faded from her triton. They spurred forward, harpoons at the ready. Sand whips lassoed the quickest two selkies and slung across the yard. A wave of snow rushed up as the others approached, causing them to fall back. Davy watched the spirits quickly dart off into the woods.

_Blast it! _

Davy gritted her teeth and raced forward.

Jack was desperately trying to think of a plan. When he felt they were far enough away from the selkies, he set Jamie down.

"That woman is nuts!" He glanced back toward the distant sound of angry selkie screeches. "We've gotta get Jamie out of here."

_But how?_ He couldn't just keep flying with the boy. It was nighttime in the Alaskan wilderness. In _winter_. Jamie was still in his pajamas. He hadn't given a second's thought to his own safety when he came to help. Jack felt a twinge of pride in his young friend's selflessness, even though Jamie had been the kelpies' actual target.

Sandy waved his arms to get Jack's attention.

"What is it, Sandy?" Jamie asked.

The dreamsand started to form into readable pictographs when something cut through them, causing the sand to crumble and spill down over the Sandman's brow. Jack glanced to see a dagger lodge embed in the trunk of a nearby fir. He turned and saw Davy Jones and her selkies rising from the ground, dripping wet. A trail of water like a slug's slime snaked back into the woods behind her.

"Perhaps ye didn't know," she said, glowering at him through strands of messy, dripping hair, "but there's a wee brook here. And where there's water-"

She brought her triton back to throw.

"-there's Davy Jones."

Just who struck first, no one knew. Within seconds, however, ice riddled two selkies, and two more went sailing into trees from the Sandman's whips and were instantly knocked out. The last three tried to distract the sand whips to get at Jamie, but only one managed to snatch at him. When it did, Jamie responded by clubbing its bare foot. It shrieked in pain and dropped its harpoon, grabbing its injured extremity and hopping about on its uninjured foot. The selkie's tactical blunder gave the Sandman an opening to lasso all three and hurl them off into uncharted reaches of the countryside.

At the same time, Jack Frost found himself going head-to-head with the Keeper of the Deep.

After deflecting her throw with a blast of ice magic, Jack rushed forward and brought his staff down over Davy's head. Or tried to, anyway. Davy, however, was the elder spirit and thoroughly blooded in warfare. Spinning out of the way, she slammed her triton into a tree trunk to break the ice covering it and then lunged, three fish-spearing points steadied on Jack's face. Jack ducked into a roll at the very last moment, and Davy overshot her mark. He jammed his staff between her legs and snared an ankle, then twisted sharply.

Davy hit the ground in a roll of her own, sweeping out her hand toward the little watery trail left by her footsteps and slung from her hair. The water leapt from the snow and splashed Jack right between the eyes. Jack cried out, rubbing his eyes with his forearm to dislodge the dirt and debris trapped in the water. Davy brought her triton around to sweep Jack's legs, but he leapt clear of the attack and hopped back out of the way. She pounded the snow angrily with her fist, then rolled backward and got to her feet.

"I have to hand it to ye, laddie," Davy swung her triton around and gripped it with both hands. "There be few people what vexes Davy Jones and lives to tell the tale."

Jack trained his staff on her, still squinting from the debris in one eye.

"I take that as a compliment."

"Ye won't be laughing when I spear ye on the end of my triton, ye pitiful excuse for a talking refrigerator!"

"You know," Jack said, grinning just to annoy her, "I know this Pooka who would _love_ to meet you."

Suddenly, Davy darted in low and thrust her triton forward. Jack danced away, batting away the wicked prongs with his staff. Davy let the momentum carry her, bringing around her elbow and catching Jack on the temple. He staggered back from the blow, looking up just in time to see spear points diving at him. Jack brought his staff up a mere half-second before a sharpened tip grazed his nose. He quickly discovered he was using all of his might to stay on his feet.

_She's so strong! _

Davy Jones let out a mocking chuckle. "So, the laddie can fight, can he?" A grin toyed at her lips. "Tell me, then: who are ye, to go through such trouble for one wee child?"

It was all Jack could do to hold her off, and his arms were tiring. The Sandman was likely still holding off the selkies. Jack didn't know, really. During their scuffle, Jack and Davy had herded themselves farther off into the woods, well away from the original battle site.

But if he didn't do something soon, Jamie was as good as…!

"The name..."

He summoned up as much of his remaining energy as he could spare, drawing on the chill winter essence in the snow around him, and forced it into his hands, out into his staff.

"...Is Jack Frost!"

Davy's mouth fell agape when the staff in her opponent's hands suddenly crystallized over with thick, heavy frost, and then spread up the metal prongs of her triton before she could fathom what was going on. By the time she did, Jack had yanked his staff down, bringing Davy down with it. The Keeper of the Deep smacked her head into the top of Jack's, causing her to see stars.

Her moment's hesitation gave Jack all the time he needed.

Jack spun around, letting Davy fall to the snow in attempt to wrench the triton from her. Davy held fast. Without warning, he jumped up, letting the winds carry him- and his unruly burden -skyward. He swung his staff about, praying it wouldn't snap from the weight of the spirit swinging from the end of her frozen triton.

"Let go!" Davy screeched at him.

"_You_ let go!"

"Blast you, ye-"

Davy's body fell slack, her eyes rolling into the back of her head and the handle of the triton slipped through her loosened fingers. She fell lifelessly to the ground, landing in the soft cushion of a snow bank.

Jack floated back down to the ground. He looked over at Sandy, who was tossing a dreamsand baseball up and catching it. Jamie had his bat up and ready for a second swing. Jack laughed.

"Nice shot, Jamie."

The Guardian of Fun glanced back to the crumbled form of Davy Jones. Over her head, golden images of mermaids and seals played volleyball with a puffer fish. The slightest of smiles tugged at her lips.

Jack yanked the triton free from his staff.

"Where are the selkies?"

Sandy told him they were all asleep, with the exception of the two he had used for mythical creature shot-put.

"Are you alright, Jamie?" Jack asked. The boy nodded.

"I'm fine," he pointed his bat toward the figure on the ground, "but what are we going to do about her?"

"Hmm..."

_Jamie has a point. She'll just track him down again if we leave her out here._

He held the triton up and looked it over. Suddenly, a wide grin spread across his face.

"I've got an idea."


	13. Ch13 - Wherein A Child Proves Wisest

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

"Wherein A Child Proves Wisest"

Nicholas St. North, the Guardian who proudly proclaimed his ability to see wonder in all things, stood with one hand on his hip and the other to his forehead, unable to process the scene before him.

"Alright, Jack Frost," he said, trying to maintain his composure, "I will- how does expression go? I will 'bite'. Why is boy who help us with Pitch _and_ Davy Jones in my office? And on day before Christmas Eve, no less!"

Jack flinched at the larger man's voice. He didn't think North minded having their Jamie at the workshop, but kidnapping another spirit (even though she tried to kidnap Jamie and thrash both the Sandman and himself) and tossing the whole lot in on North right before the Big Guy's busiest day of the year was suicidal.

"We didn't exactly have much of a choice," Jack offered up.

North wearily sank down into his chair, shaking his head and muttering in Russian. Jack ran down a quick recap of events. North's eyes glimmered at the vivid retelling of the battle, but the accompanying mirth all but disappeared when Jack informed him of Davy's self-imposed mission.

"...After Sandy knocked her out, we had to use the snow globe you gave him to get here."

_Ah, yes. _

North remembered giving the Sandman and the rest of the Guardians (sans Jack, seeing as how he wasn't part of the team at the time) portal-making snow globes the previous Christmas. The other Guardians, though, had their own preferred methods of travel, so North expected the globes would be set aside for emergencies.

_Such as now_, North thought, frowning.

"The rest," Jack continued, "you pretty much know."

North knew, alright: the sight of a snow-covered, stringy-haired, fully disheveled Davy Jones being carried over the shoulder of Jack Frost into his office, slung into and then tied to a chair replayed in his mind.

"So what do we do, North?"

North looked down at the slumbering form of Davy Jones. Several strands of Christmas lights- the first thing Jack could get his hands on -bound her to the chair. Her wrists, too, were bound with an old scarf, her feet frozen to the floor. Jack held her key; the triton had deformed moments after Davy fell asleep. North couldn't agree with using his decorations for such a purpose, but it was almost comical the way the sleeping spirit lit up with flashes of incandescent amber as the violent and almost universally detested spirit smiled serenely at her secret dreams.

"Uhn..."

The dreamsand crumbled over Davy's brow and her head lulled to the side.

"She's coming to!" Jamie said.

The Keeper of the Deep shook off the last vestiges of sleep and looked around, blinking owlishly. For a split second, the slight smile still played on her lips. It disappeared the moment she saw Jack Frost.

And her key.

"Ye thieving blackguard! Give that back!"

She lunged toward him, but her body remained pinioned in place. She looked down, utterly bewildered when she noticed the twinkling amber bulbs.

"Christmas lights?"

"I could have frozen you solid," Jack told her, "but the kid was afraid it would hurt you."

Davy threw her head back and stuck out her chest defiantly. "Yer puny ice spells didn't even give me sirens a cold. What harm could they do me?"

"Sirens?" Jamie asked.

"Aye," she said, "the first night he decided to interfere."

"I thought you said they were selkies?"

Davy gave them both a look that read _Are you stupid?_ "Are ye telling me ye can't tell the difference between a selkie and a siren?" Jamie and Jack shrugged. Davy rolled her eyes. "Great, now ye'll be telling me there's no difference between a seal and a fish next."

"I'm confused," Jamie looked up at Jack.

North cleared his throat.

"Ms. Jones," North started, "is true young Bennet is marked for sea?"

Jones nodded.

North sighed. "I feared as much." He stood from his chair.

"What?" Jack asked. "You can make her leave Jamie alone, right?"

North stared down at the desk for a long time, clenching and unclenching his fists slowly, brow furrowed in thought. Jack's heart sank lower with each pop and crack of those huge knuckles. Several minutes of silence told Jack all he needed to know.

"So that's it, then? You're just going to let this sea witch take Jamie and drown him?" He leered viciously at North. "He's a kid. We're Guardians. We're supposed to protect children!"

"Jack?"

Frost cut Jamie off, too angry at North's indifference to listen. "You weren't the one out there blasting icebergs out of a whirlpool- which, by the way, had the nasty effect of turning itself inside-out and shooting them back at you -and beating off horse mutants and harpoon-wielding nutcases! Seriously, North, did you drink too much eggnog? Because you're pretty much throwing Jamie to the wind, telling him to flap his arms and fly."

"Jack-"

North's head snapped up. "You no understand, Jack!"

"What don't I understand? You'd let Jamie die without a fight!"

"_Jack-_"

"You listen to me, Jack Frost-"

_WHAM!_

Both stopped shouting suddenly when the door slammed shut hard enough the knock several items off the wall. The two Guardians turned to see Jamie, red-faced, his hand flat on the door. North stood up and Jack looked at the boy, unable to reassure him but half-tempted to try anyway. When Jack opened his mouth, Jamie held up a hand.

"Okay," Jamie spoke slowly, "considering I'm the one who is 'marked for the sea', as you say, I think I ought to have a say in this."

North nodded. "Go ahead."

He looked to the spirit in the chair. "I want to hear what Davy Jones has to say."

Jack was flabbergasted. "Jamie, you can't be serious! She tried to-"

The Sandman put his arm in front of Jack and North grabbed him by the arm. Jack tried vainly to shrug North off. He glared at Sandy but, instead of glaring back, Sandy merely nodded toward a most important exchange taking place. Jamie had pulled up a second chair in front of Davy Jones and settled himself into it. The Keeper of the Deep raised an eyebrow and drew back in the chair, eyeing the boy as if looking for a blow that would follow.

"Davy Jones?"

"Aye?"

"I'm Jamie," he told her. "Jamie Bennet."

The two of them stared at one another for a several long moments. Jack tightened his fist, causing the prongs of the key to bite into his palm. He looked down at it. Davy couldn't harm Jamie without it, not while she was tied to a chair and her feet frozen to the ground. It was the only reassurance he had.

"Jack told me a little about you."

"And just how does he know about me?"

"I told him."

Davy looked over Jamie's shoulder at North. "So, ye've been getting lessons from a winter sprite and Father Christmas?" Davy said scornfully. "And I suppose they've told ye all about what a horrible person, what drags poor innocents back to sea and allows children to drown?"

"They told me about the Leviathan."

The name of the legendary monster wiped the defiance from her face. A tsunami of absolute hatred raged in her cold, dark eyes.

"They know nothing about that horrible demon!"

Jack took a step forward, ready to freeze her lips shut, but Sandy stepped in front of him and put up his hands, pushing Jack back by the thighs because he wasn't tall enough to reach anything else.

"Then tell me."

Davy froze.

"What?"

"Tell me." Without Davy's shouting and the Guardians' scuffling, the words rang out loudly and with a pristine sincerity and boldness. "Tell me because I want to know why a spirit made by MiM would take children out to sea and let then drown just to keep something else from getting to them first. Is the Leviathan really so horrible that MiM would have you do something like that?"

Then, for the first time since her appearance the night before, Davy's face no longer bore hatred, coldness, or arrogant defiance. Her facial muscles relaxed, her eyebrows rising and teeth no longer gritted. The blankness of utter shock lasted for nearly a full five minutes before she answered softly, her ye olde seaman's speech now barely an inflection.

"More than you will ever know, child. More than you will ever know."


	14. Ch14 - Davy Jones Remembers

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

"Davy Jones Remembers"

"I want you to tell me anyway," Jamie told her.

Davy couldn't believe what she was hearing. This boy wanted to know about her, about the Leviathan? It wasn't just the shock before drowning, either, where the victim was wrestling with the death that had come for him. Not the desperate urge for closure at the abrupt end of one's life. No, as scared as he was- she could see him trying to hide his trembling hands, the glint of fear in his eyes -he wanted to hear _her_ side.

It was several minutes before she could respond. No one had ever asked her! Not a spirit, not a mortal. Her sirens and selkies did their part, singing to the doomed and fighting off agents of the Leviathan. Now and then, one of them would bring her a particularly delicious fish or a bottled message that some curious child had tossed into the water, knowing that it would bring some measure of comfort to her otherwise morbid existence. However, they, like the other spirits of MiM (the ones that were willing to believe Manny had given her such a purpose), had an unofficial rule that they would not pry into her dark and hated life. Nor would she ever ask them to listen.

Now, someone wanted to listen. A _child_ wanted to listen! She could almost feel her heart breaking, knowing this boy's inevitable watery fate. If she'd had to hear every child's dying words along with its thoughts, she knew she would have gone mad long ago.

Still, the offer, once given, was as tempting to Davy as waves to a surfer.

"The Leviathan is a horrible demon," she began. "He used to prey on everyone: mortal and mythical, child or adult. It doesn't matter to him. Those he consumes, if they don't fall directly into his stomach acid, are marooned on parts of his stomach lining until they give in to sleep or madness and wind up like the rest. But it's worse after his victims perish. Every soul that dies within him becomes a part of him. _Nourishes_ him." Davy nearly gagged on the word when she thought of how anything could nurture such a cruel beast. "The Leviathan was once a sentient ferry that took drowned souls to Hell. But from the moment I was made, I've fought him. The selkies and sirens joined in, but it was a long, hard battle. A battle that, in the end, was a draw."

"You see," she told Jamie, "the Leviathan cannot get back into hell now."

Jamie thought he saw a hint of a smile on her lips, but it disappeared as quickly as it came.

"But neither can I stop him indefinitely. While I cannot stop deaths claimed by the sea, I can stop the Leviathan from taking them. He can only consume something living. If it is dead, then he cannot touch it."

Silence filled the room.

Then-

"You've been inside it?" Jamie asked.

Davy Jones nodded.

"How come you didn't...you know..."

"Wind up fish food?" Davy asked. Jamie nodded. "Because I can control water, even when in the Leviathan's stomach. A bonus from MiM," she nodded skyward, "when he made me."

A look of realization crossed Jamie's face. "You've gone after them, haven't you?"

Davy wouldn't answer at first.

Jamie pressed her. "That's why you know what the inside of the Leviathan looks like, and why you know that anyone who is 'marked' will wind up tracked down by those kelpies. I'm right, aren't I?"

Davy's stomach churned. _It feels like he's looking into my soul_, she said, glancing away from the steady hold of the boy's too-warm, too-wise brown eyes. He wouldn't let the question go, and she knew it. Many times, she had wanted others to know what she went through, but telling them, letting that out? It would make her vulnerable. It was awful enough to feel helpless when the Leviathan beat her to the marked, and just as much when watching those she "saved" cease struggling against the briny depths. She wouldn't make herself feel more vulnerable than she had to. She hated the feeling.

It almost made her laugh: finally having someone who wanted know, but finding herself unwilling to tell. _How ironic..._

Jamie answered for her. "That has to be it."

"Whoa, whoa, whoa! Are you saying she has willing gone into the belly of some beast? No way. I don't believe it."

Davy refused to look up from the floor, but she knew Frost was speaking.

_Jack Frost_. She almost laughed. How stupid of her not to realize whom he was! The little troublemaker practically gave her the icebergs she was going to take the ship down with that night.

_Little trouble-making "Guardian"_, she remembered. The Boogeyman's return might have affected her more if she hadn't had two Norwegian fishing boat wrecks and half a dozen waterlogged tribesmen to drag out of the Amazon River during the time the Guardians were fighting him. When one of the sirens showed up, doing somersaults out of the water, unable to keep the news contained any longer, Davy had only caught the highlights before she had to hurry off. After all, the hurricane season had just begun.

That's when she realized it:

_Jamie Bennet! Sweet moonbeams and starfish, the newest marked is the Child Who Believed!_

Now it made sense why the Guardians were unusually protective (and familiar) with this one boy. He'd practically saved them all from Pitch Black! Now she had the duty of taking the boy out to sea and letting him have a merciful death before the kelpies could drag him into the Leviathan's jowls...

_As if this job couldn't possibly get any worse..._

"How else would she know? Do you think the Man in the Moon has been in there?"

"He hasn't, but someone else has."

She looked up and saw that she had become the center of attention. She ignored the curious stares of North and the Sandman and hateful glower coming from Jack Frost, turning her attention on Jamie.

"Only three people have ever managed to escape: two men and a young girl. One was Jonah, whom I'm sure you've heard. The other was a Viking, who started calling the Leviathan "Jörmungandr" and spread a rumor around that it was a giant snake that encircled the Earth. The last was a little Italian child."

"Then why didn't you try what they did instead of trying to spear Jamie with a harpoon?" Jack shuffled forward, only for North to yank him back.

"I would never have harmed the boy!"

"You call wanting to drown him 'not harmful'?"

"In comparison to being eaten by the Leviathan? Not in the slightest."

"You keep telling yourself that."

Davy struggled against the Christmas lights and ice, but she couldn't move. Luckily, neither could Jack. He calmed down enough once Jamie threatened to let Sandy put him to sleep.

"Don't you think I would have told them if I could? That's the only way to get out of being marked by the sea- escaping the Leviathan's gullet!"

Davy cast her eyes to the floor. Her being trapped by the chair, stuffed into such close surroundings under scrutinizing gazes was fast becoming too much for her to handle. Not to mention every second that she wasted was another second cut off from the sea, unable to direct her sirens and selkies.

_Another second the Leviathan is free to prey on the innocent_.

"All of them passed on long before MiM created me," she admitted, "and none of them shared the secret of their escape. Sure, I fancy Jonah prayed a lot, but there must have been something that expunged him from the inside_._ I just don't know what!"

Then, as if a dam had burst, the words poured from Davy in a flood. Even if she had wanted to stop talking, she could not. It was as though she was in a trance, trapped in memories of her attempts to foil her arch nemesis.

"I went in after the marked once. There's enough light inside from bacteria on the walls to see. It's a wretched, horrible place that smells like rotted eggs, putrid milk, and dirty latrines boiled under the summer sun. There were three of them: a family. The adults were lost almost immediately, but the child...the child could see me."

"Normally, no one can see me. Sometimes sailors' children could, back then, but it was very rare. And this boy did. He...he couldn't have been more than six or seven..."

The memory of the small boy in breeches and tiny waistcoat, a miniature version of the sea captain whose fated ship was slammed against the shoals by the unseen Leviathan, came rushing back to her. Of his pale, frightened face. His horror at watching his parents disappear as splashes into the translucent goo surrounding the fleshy island he was on. She could still see the terror in those big green eyes...

"I tried everything: Slapped him to keep him awake. Shielded him with water every time the Leviathan tried to wash him down. I tried consoling him, telling him it would be alright. He couldn't fit through the air hole, and I couldn't widen it with my triton. I must have jabbed and prodded the Leviathan's stomach lining for days. But-"

She sucked in a shaky breath. It was awful, remembering the details.

"I don't know how long we'd been in there. Enough for me to get hungry, so that was a lot. I went over and thought I'd try finding a weak point in the stomach lining again. Then, I heard the tiniest splash..."

Davy shook off the memories and rose back up in her seat, steeling her gaze and willing the guilt and bile back.

"You can't keep us here forever," she announced. "The kelpies will come after him. If the Leviathan finds out I'm trapped here, he'll go on a rampage and start attacking every craft and swimmer he sees- be they marked or not." She narrowed her eyes on Jack Frost as if to say _I should know, I've tried that, too_.

It was silent for a few moments. Then, of all people, Sandy looked at Davy and called up a couple of dreamsand images. Fish? A hoop...a hoop with water? No, not a hoop and fire, but a portal with fire. Fish going into the fire and disappearing. Then, a large circle around the hoop, a thick line slicing through it like a "No Such-and-Such" sign.

North cleared his throat. "What Sandy is asking is why not send Leviathan back to Hell and keep him there? Why is he not able to go back?"

For the first time since Davy got there, she felt a small twinge of pride. She straightened up and puffed out her chest slightly. "Because of me."

"You?" Jamie asked.

"Aye, lad," she slipped back into her former speech, "and the key there."

Jack eyed the key. "This thing?" Davy nodded.

"Aye. You remember the phrase 'Davy Jones' locker'? Well, that be it."

"But is key," North said, "not locker. Is not locker a box?"

Davy shook her head.

"That silly word was a cultural misunderstanding years ago," she said. "You know how translations can be. It is a "locker", yes, but in the way that it locks and unlocks things."

She gazed upon the key, her one occupational satisfaction at being the one who had kept the Leviathan locked out of his own domain for centuries spreading smugly across her face.

"The Leviathan cannot call up Hell-bound portals like other demons. There is only one big enough for him and it had to be kept locked until he needed it, or beings could come from either side and commit war. Hell itself could be unleashed, or even attacked."

"The key unlocks the portal?" Jamie asked.

"The key does many things," Davy told him. "The Man in the Moon managed to seal the portal, and gave me the key for safekeeping. I can use it to control the water. To create waterspouts and whirlpools. Anything to keep the Leviathan and his agents from getting at the marked."

"Then why not lead Leviathan to portal?"

"Yeah, North's right," Jack said. "You've followed him all these years. Why couldn't you just unlock the portal and send the Leviathan home?"

"I can't do that!" Davy said. "Not so long as he has all of those innocent souls trapped within him! If he makes it into Hell, they'll be trapped there forever! The souls of _children_. Of their mothers and fathers, brothers and sisters. Of anyone he's consumed from a shipwreck!"

Davy pulled against her bonds, but they held firm. She _had_ to convince them to free her!

North and the Sandman were two of the very few people that did not despise her for her dark and morbid tasks. There had been a Christmas Eve many years ago when she had to turn her head from the sky, unwilling to meet the devastated gaze of either when sugar plum dreams had been lost forever to the waves. Whether it was because they felt wrong to question the Man in the Moon for creating her, or because they had just seen the damage the Leviathan could, she didn't know. Perhaps MiM explained to them, for they secretly helped all those but the marked; the ones that were perished smiling, never awakening from the most wonderful dreams they likely ever had. The Sandman had gone a step further and tried to talk to her on the one night when Davy had climbed aboard the Spainard's vessel after warding off the Leviathan from an unmarked ship, but Davy, feeling awkward and conflicted, leapt over the railing and plunged far down into the depths so she couldn't face someone whose joy she'd robbed.

But Jack Frost? He was just as stubborn as she. How could she get that boy to understand? Knowing he would be the hardest to convince, she trained her eyes on Jack, speaking low and clearly.

"Listen to me: if Jamie remains here, he will _never_ be safe. Do you understand that? You cannot always watch after him." _Just as I could not with the captain's son._ "He'll have to take a bath sometime. Get a glass of water. Go to the bathroom. Why do you think I mention this, Frost? It's happened before! I know! I was there!"

Jack's mouth opened and closed several times like a fish thrown onto dry land. Davy knew he probably felt exactly as he looked, now that he realized how vain any attempts to save his young mortal friend were. She knew that feeling all too well, had seen it on the faces of the drowning marked ones' companions. It was by no means a good feeling.

Finally, one hand to his head, Jack slumped against North's desk. He wouldn't look in Jamie's direction.

"It's not right..."

"It never is."

Suddenly bouncing with an idea, the Sandman pointed above his head. There were images of a harpoon going through a fish, and then the fish reforming into several tiny angels, fluttering up and away.

"Sandy says-"

"I think I understand this one, North," she said. "Yes, if I could free the other souls trapped in the Leviathan, I would personally kick his fishy carcass back into the underworld. The only time that's ever happened has been when someone has escaped, though."

She saw the skeptical look on Jack's face.

"MiM told me it sets off a domino effect: the innocent souls are freed, and the escapee can never be harmed by the Leviathan or his agents ever again."

"So we just have to find a way to get the Leviathan to throw up and Jamie will be safe?"

"That's the theory, but I've tried everything! Nothing has ever worked!"

North wrinkled his nose. _Did they really have to put it like that? _He shook his head, and then smiled widely and straightened.

"Yes, but until now, only you has been doing thinking." He tapped his head for emphasis. "Now, you have five brains to pick!" Davy watched him gesture grandly to the others in the room. Sandy was smiling serenely. Jamie nodded to her. Jack hopped up on the desk then began twirling the key.

"North's right," Jack said. The chain looped around his hand and he closed his fingers over the key. "It's time we put our heads together."


	15. Ch15 - Saving Jamie Bennet

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

"Saving Jamie Bennet"

The two Guardians, Davy, and Jamie immediately set to brainstorming. Despite their attempts, every idea suggested had already been tried or was too outlandish to work.

"...Sandy, I honestly doubt stuffing a giant cork in the Leviathan's blowhole and letting him build up air and water until he explodes will work. Besides, I tried that with a rock once."

The latest batch of dreamsand images crumbled with Sandy's mood.

"Sorry," she told him, and then looked to the others. "If there is a way, we should have thought of it by now."

North snapped his fingers. "Perhaps we should ask Manny!"

"Didn't you hear what the lady said?" Jack nodded toward Davy, his staff propped over his shoulder. "They never told MiM how they escaped. Besides," Jack gestured toward the window, "it's going to be daylight in Alaska soon. Sandy's dreamsand will wear off and Monty and his family will panic if they find Jamie missing."

"But with Leviathan after him, what will you do?"

"I can watch him. I fought the kelpies before, so-"

"Jack, you can't," Jamie said. "Didn't you promise to help North give everyone a white Christmas?"

Jack turned and gave Jamie an incredulous look. "Your life is in danger, and you're worried about me keeping a promise?" Jack deadpanned. "You," he pointed, "need to get your priorities straight."

Jamie crossed his arms over his chest. "Worrying about me isn't going to stop the Leviathan or kelpies," he told Jack. "Besides, if you and North don't get back to spreading Christmas cheer, Sandy doesn't give the Eastern Hemisphere good dreams, and Davy doesn't get back to the sea, you'll all have much bigger problems on you hands." He looked to the bound spirit. "Am I right, Davy Jones?"

Surprised at the boy's selflessness, Davy nodded.

"I'd really just like to go home," he admitted, "back to Burgess. I want to see Mom and Sophie again. Just in case."

"Sandy could just knock Monty's family out again," Jack translated the newest dreamsand images. "You can tell your mother you took the bus home a day early. The kelpies won't be expecting you to be in Pennsylvania while they are looking for you in Alaska." Sandy heartily agreed.

"You can take snow globe," North said, "and I can pick you up after delivering presents!"

Jamie smiled. "Thanks, you guys. Does that mean you're going to let Davy go?"

Jack shook his head. "Not until we figure this out."

"She needs to get back to the water! You heard her! Or do you want what could have happened a few days ago actually happen times...well...a lot?"

Jack couldn't argue with that. Not that little things like facts ever stopped him.

"Jack," Jamie told him, "I know you're worried, but it'll be easier to come up with a plan when we can have all of our thoughts on the same wavelength. Davy has duties, too."

After a few moments of sputtering, Jack could not come up with a valid protest. Shoulders sagged with a sigh, and then he pointed his staff on Davy. His eyes narrowed.

"I want your solemn oath that neither you nor your minions will harm Jamie," he warned. "Not until we've tried everything possible and definitely nothing until after Christmas. Do you swear it?"

Eyes as dark as the ocean depths met piercing glacier blue. The colors were different, but the determination was the same.

"I swear it."

Jack, of course, wasn't satisfied until she had repeated the promise verbatim of what he had said (he learned his lesson when Pitch broke his staff). Only then did Jack let the ice melt from Davy's legs. Jamie undid the Christmas lights. Davy stood, wobbling on stiff legs, and rubbed her arms.

"Thanks."

"Yeah, yeah," Jack said, "just get back to the ocean before the Big Fish starts tipping boats, alright?"

_It feels strange, being in league with other spirits_, Davy thought as she looked out over the snow-covered cliff. When Jamie returned to Monty's aunt and uncle's house to grab his belongings, Davy had accompanied him (along with Jack Frost, who- understandably -did not trust her entirely). She quickly met with her selkies and learned that, fortunately, the Leviathan had not yet sensed her missing presence.

Now, refreshed from the quick sleep in one of the yeti break rooms, Davy watched the sunset outside of Santoff Claussen, waiting for North's sleigh to appear on the horizon.

She heard the soft sound of feet landing in snow behind her.

"Frost," she said as he stepped up beside her.

"Jones."

The two stared out across the ocean for several minutes, not saying a word. Davy heard the wind howl as it passed under the archway of the ice cliff. A soft spray of snow whipped up and whirled off toward the ocean.

"I checked in on Jamie earlier," Jack said at last. "His mother had to put the dog up. It kept barking at the two selkies on the roof." He cracked a half-grin. "Would you happen to know anything about that?"

Davy chuckled lightly. "Would you happen to know about a little Inuit girl who fell from a cliff and miraculously landed on an ice floe?"

"You were there?"

"The child wasn't marked, but she could still drown. We help those we come to who are not marked by the sea. One of the few perks of this mirthless job."

Jack lifted his foot, twisting it this way and that, letting the snow slide off it little drizzles. "Why are only certain ones marked?"

Davy shrugged. "That's like asking why the sea is salty," she turned toward Jack. "It just is."

"But why Jamie?"

Davy pulled the puke-green hat from her belt.

"If I could choose to stop this, I would," she said. "I wanted to end it many times. I used to ask, 'Why me? Why couldn't you choose someone stronger?' It was terrible, knowing that the only time you would be seen would be during someone's dying moments, when they are willing to believe anything if it means they would have closure about their end."

She held the knitted fabric to her chest.

"Then I realized…I could do it. I could just open the portal, send the Leviathan home and never have to worry about it. I could spend the rest of my time on this earth not worrying about who was marked and who was not. No Leviathan. No kelpies. Just turn the marked loose on shore and they wouldn't be my problem."

She looked down at the fabric in her hands.

"This is a very ugly hat. Who gives her child a hat like this?"

Jack laughed loudly. "_That_ was random!" Davy quirked a grin. "Maybe the sea meant to just mark the hat and not its owner?"

"Maybe..."

Davy's smile soon faded as she fell into deep thought.

"What made you decide to keep fighting?"

"...Seeing the empty spot where the captain's son should have been."

If Jack had a response, the loud _crack!_ and sudden appearance of a whirling snow vortex several hundred feet above them cut him off. North's boisterous laughter rang out amidst the chorus of jingling bells and snorting reindeer. Davy turned and hurried back through the snow.


	16. Ch16 - Call To Arms

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

"Call to Arms"

Jamie rolled out of the sleigh with a whoop of joy, his legs wobbling and making him stagger for a few brief moments. "That was a blast!"

"Everyone loves the sleigh," North said to himself, chuckling, as he patted one of the reindeer. He gave the yetis their instructions and turned back to see that a third member of their group had arrived.

"Hey, kid," Jack Frost said, ruffling Jamie's hair, "didja have a good time?"

"It was awesome! You should've seen the way we sailed over the trees...my house looked just like a doll's house! Hey, maybe I should tell Sophie about that for next Christmas. Do you think she'd want a doll house that looked just like ours?"

Jack laughed at the animated way Jamie explained his trip. He glanced up as North walked closer. North raised an eyebrow in unspoken question, but Jack understood. _Are the others here yet?_

Jack nodded toward the door leading back into the workshop. A few minutes later, North, Jack, and Jamie were standing beneath the globe with a few old friends.

"Bunny! Toothi-_hurg furgle dech hurgh_!"

"Wow, look how little your teeth are-and pearly white! Maybe not as pearly as Jack's but-"

"Tooth," North told the overzealous fairy, "fingers out of mouth."

Giggling nervously, the Tooth Fairy complied. Bunnymund, who had been readjusting the boomerangs in his bandolier, stepped forward. "Jack filled us in, mate," he told North. "Little ankle-biter's gotten himself into a right mess with Davy Jones, has he?"

"I am afraid so."

"But North, what are going to do?" Toothiana asked, flitting about. "Feathers don't do well near water and Bunnymund-."

The Tooth Fairy shot the Pooka a concerned look. "Rabbits can't swim, mate." He grunted and shrugged off the comment, then pulled out an egg and brush and started painting.

"Swimming is not part of plan, Bunny," North told him.

Bunnymund laughed sardonically. "Uh, last time I checked, North, Davy Jones was a water spirit. You know, 'The Keeper of the Deep'?"

"Yes, yes, but where we go, water is solid."

The Easter Bunny quirked an eyebrow. "I don't follow." Suddenly, Bunnymund's ears twitched and he looked around. "Crickey!"

Everyone turned to see the very Keeper of the Deep walking toward the group. Bunnymund's hands went to his boomerangs and Toothiana's Baby Tooths flew behind her, gazing nervously over their queen's shoulders. North noticed Davy's mouth turn down slightly before returning to her normal defiant stoicism.

While deep down, North hated the thought that another spirit's sole purpose was preventing children's eternal torment by allowing them to drown, he was one of the few spirits that had fought other demons bent on similar missions. Who was he, the former King of Bandits, to judge MiM's decision or Davy's life?

_ It is a horrible job, but someone has had to do it_, he thought. He stepped forward and waved his arms in grand welcoming gesture.

"Davy Jones!"

The slight raise of her eyebrows toward him spoke volumes: _Thanks, North._

"You invited this blighter here?" Bunnymund cocked his head toward Davy. North nodded.

"Of course! She is helping to save Jamie Bennet."

Bunnymund was aghast. "North," he let out an empty chuckle, "that's Davy Jones. The woman who drowns people? Have you lost your mind?"

North crossed his arms. "Mind is same place it always is. I thought you said Jack filled you in?"

"He told us the Leviathan's after Jamie and you guys had Davy Jones strung up in Christmas lights earlier, but he never said anything about working with her! North, we're Guardians. We protect kids-"

"Just like Davy Jones does from the Leviathan. Isn't that right, Davy?"

North looked up to see Jack Frost had one arm propped up on Davy's shoulder. The Sandman and Jamie, too, were standing by her side. Bunnymund's mouth dropped open and for several minutes, he was unable to so much as sputter in protest. Davy, too, seemed to be of the same consensus, having neither been used to the attention nor expecting Jack to come to her rescue. It wasn't long before Toothiana was giving Davy a full dental inspection and the Baby Tooths were cautiously lingering around the Keeper of the Deep.

"And I thought pirates all had scurvy! You could do with a bit more flossing, maybe a cleaning. Then your teeth will be as white as a sand dollar!"

"Tooth."

"Oops. Sorry, North." She looked at Davy sideways and giggled. "I can't help myself."

Bunnymund finally threw his hands in the air.

"Fine, if you all have lost your wits, I may as well join you."

North clapped him hard on the shoulder. "That is spirit!" He went over to join the circle.

"You'd better have a good reason for this, North."

"He does," Jack said. He tapped the straight end of his staff against Jamie's leg, urging the boy forward. Jamie pulled a book out of his coat. It was small, thick and covered in a pastel-painted image of fairies. The Baby Tooths floated over, cooing "Oohs" and "Ahs" as they admired the cover.

"I think I've found a way to escape the Leviathan and free all the souls he's trapped."

He turned around to Davy.

"You said the little girl that escaped was from Italy, right?"

"Aye."

"Well, I realized when I was looking through my books that there is an old Italian fairytale with a creature similar to the Leviathan," he flipped open the book and began thumbing through it. "It sounded like a whale." He handed the book up for her to read.

"_Pinocchio_?" Jack asked. Jamie nodded.

"In the story, Pinocchio gets swallowed by a monster whale, but he and his father escape by building a fire. The smoke chokes the whale and it coughs them out."

Davy cradled the book with one hand and ran her trembling fingers over the picture of the little wooden puppet bravely holding a lighted chunk of driftwood. Her lips quivered and her eyes widened.

"You said the Leviathan has a blowhole, so he has to breathe _sometime_," Jamie said. "That means he has lungs. Lungs can be irritated by smoke."

"Have you ever tried that, Davy?" Jack asked.

Davy could only stare down at the pages, wide-eyed.

"You act like you've never heard the story of _Pinocchio_ before."

Davy shook her head, then flipped the pages back and forth, looking at the colored pages for instruction and becoming visibly disappointed when she could find only a few. Jamie's eyes widened.

"You've never read _Pinocchio_? But, you've been around for-for how long? I mean, you heard of Jonah, so..."

Suddenly, a thought occurred to North:

"Davy Jones, you cannot read, can you?"

Davy shook her head. "It never seemed important."

Looking down at the page, however, her expression and guilt-ridden eyes told what centuries of failed skirmishes and lost innocents could never convey:

_If reading a story could have saved even one child, perhaps it was more important than she ever imagined._


	17. Ch17 - Jumping The Gun

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

"Jumping the Gun"

After deciding to try the plot point from _Pinocchio_, the small group ate Christmas dinner together (at North's insistence) before grabbing a few hours preparatory rest in a few of the guest rooms. However, two spirits could not rest.

Davy Jones was hurriedly adjusting her daggers and testing the sharpness of a sturdy harpoon when Jack Frost found her. He pulled the key out of his hoodie pocket and tossed it to her.

"You'll need this."

"Jack?"

"You honestly don't think I'm going to let you do this alone, do you?" He pointed his staff at the plastic-wrapped fairytale book jammed into her belt. She could see he had a large waterproof sack strapped around him. "Firewood," he said, noticing her eyes lingering on the pack.

"This isn't your fight-"

"The heck it isn't!"

Despite his whispering, the volume was greatly amplified in the darkened iced-over tunnel. His thin frame was heaving from pent-up rage. Davy shook her head.

"The Leviathan has always been my fight." She pointed her key at him. "Go back to your snowballs and fun times, and watch over the boy."

Jack leveled his staff at her. "Jamie Bennet was the first child that ever believed in me. If it wasn't for him, the Guardians wouldn't be here, and there wouldn't be any innocence in the souls you fight over."

Davy snorted. "I can't talk ye out of this, can I?"

Jack smirked. "Not unless you actually decide on a speech pattern and stick to it. Why do you keep switching like that? You sound like you have two personalities."

Davy chuckled and shrugged.

"When you've done this job as long as I have, you tend to be a little on the crazy side."

She turned and, Jack's laughter following, she headed out of the tunnel.

When they made it down to the shore, Davy walked knee-deep into the water, cupped her hands around her mouth, and screeched. Jack nearly tripped over his own feet at the shrill keening noise, which was followed by a series of clicks and variously pitched whines. He was about to ask if Davy truly had lost her mind when he saw dark shadows gliding through the water. He readied his staff but Davy didn't seem worried. If anything, she looked relieved.

When the shadows drew close enough to the ice, heads poked up from the water. Seals! There were dozens of them! But not just seals. Several...mummy heads?

Or, so he thought. Another look revealed that he was actually looking at mermaids, bedecked in tightly woven reed turbans and cowls. When three pulled themselves up onto an ice floe, he noticed that the cowls connected to long-sleeved tunics that cinched at the mid-tail. Bits of brightly colored hair jutted out from under their turbans, but Jack could scarcely tell the exact hues in the moonlight. Each of the three ninja-mermaids wielded a wicked harpoon and several daggers were jammed into bandoliers running over their chests.

One cried out when she saw him and began shouting in garbled hisses and clicks. Davy chuckled.

"She remembers you." Upon seeing Jack's confusion, she added, "You froze her the other night."

"Oh," he said, turning to the mermaid, "Sorry."

The mermaid crossed her arms over her chest and harrumphed. She and Davy conversed a few moments in click-speak, and then Davy turned back to the seals. Within moments, a great gasp ran through the mermaids, and the seals barked, whined and splashed with wild abandon. Davy waved her arms out and shrieked loudly, ending the ruckus. When the mermaids and seals had quieted, Davy turned back to Jack.

"Let's go."

Davy slipped further out into the water, but Jack hesitated.

"Can't you swim?"

"I can," Jack said. _I just have this little thing about water_, he mentally added. Davy took his wrist.

"I won't let go of you, if you're worried."

Jack scowled at her. "I'm not worried."

"Then you want to go through the portal by yourself?"

Jack raised an eyebrow. "Portal?"

Davy touched the pronged end of her key to the water's surface. A miniature whirlpool appeared, and from within it came a blast of icy, bitterly cold wind. Before he knew it, Davy dragged him into the swirling vortex. Then, just ask quickly, he flew from the water and landed onto an ice floe.

Jack looked around to see a barren icy wasteland twinkling under a twilit sky. Davy pulled herself up onto the ice as her legion of seals and mermaids began popping out of the water.

"Antarctica?"

"Aye," Davy said. "This be where the Leviathan's portal to Hell lies."

She pointed to a cliff made entirely of ice. Several frozen archways covered in some of the largest icicles Jack had ever seen marked the pathway to what looked like a large ramp heading into a wide tunnel. The tunnel wasn't very deep because Jack could see the end of it.

He looked to Davy, her face deeply etched with solemnity.

"How many innocent souls have passed through this gate," she said softly, "before I was created? How many families and friends never meant to be separated in eternity were?"

Jack sat up and patted her on the shoulder. She looked at him, a brief glimmer of hope floating in those dark pools of sorrow.

"I hope this plan works, laddie. I really hope it does."

_I hope it does, too._ _For Jamie's sake..._

He looked at Davy.

_And hers, too._


	18. Ch18 - Kelpies Bombard Santa's Workshop

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

"Kelpies Bombard Santa's Workshop"

North awakened from his dreams of dancing candy canes to a loud, earth-shattering screech.

"WE'RE UNDER ATTACK!"

In seconds, North had his scimitars and, for once, was glad he had fallen asleep working in his office.

Not since his youth as a bandit stealing his way through the Russian steppe had North ever seen such a chaotic sight. A battle was fully underway on the lower floors of the workshop. Yetis were bashing, throwing off, and slinging what looked like horses with half-rotted lobster tails in place of their back legs. Panicking elves darted under tables, scurrying out mere seconds before a kelpie or yeti took out the table that had been a momentary refuge. Even the Baby Tooths were involved, yanking at the mane and eyelashes of a kelpie that had one of the yetis pinned.

Three of the Guardians made a ring around Jamie Bennet. The flurry of sword slashes, boomerang throws and dreamsand whips met with powerful hooves from every angle.

North swung himself over the side as one kelpie leapt off the floor below him. He landed astride its back, causing the kelpie to plummet down into a stampede of its fellows. North managed to leap off just in time, using a yuletide banner as a rope to swing himself out into the skirmish. He landed just short of the circle and body-slammed a kelpie that had made it past Sandy's defenses. North stood up covered in seaweed.

"About time you got out of bed!" Bunnymund shouted.

"What has happened?"

"These horse things just started popping out from everywhere!" Toothiana shouted. "Seaweed slipped out of faucets, up through drains and toilets-" A desk slammed into the kelpie she was fighting and sent it sailing across the room. She turned and yelled, "Thanks, Phil!"

Phil the Yeti nodded before throwing up his arms and running back into the fray.

"Yeah, Li'l Miss Hygiene here was in the bathroom at the time," Bunnymund said, sparing a chuckle.

"How could anyone interrupt a girl's most sacred daily regime?" Toothiana screeched. North looked down at Sandy, who made primping motions at his hair. Toothiana noticed and shook her head. "I meant my morning flossing. Look out!"

North turned around and brought one scimitar down diagonally through one kelpie. It screamed and its body fizzled and unraveled into strings of decaying seaweed. North wiped the muck from his face with his forearm.

"Where are Jack Frost and Davy Jones?"

"I don't know," Jamie said, "but my fairytale book is gone."

"What?"

North slashed through two more kelpies and shoved his boot into the snapping face of another. When he brought his scimitar up to take out a fourth, it fell apart before he even touched it. North glanced over to see a yeti patting the side of its head where the harpoon had taken off some fur.

Within moments, selkies, their seal skins making them look like Tarzan in plural, rushed into the room, leaping over broken tables and half-dazed yetis, throwing harpoons with deadly accuracy and then leaping at the remaining kelpies- tearing at them with nails, teeth, and anything within arms' reach they could use as bludgeons.

"Selkies!" Jamie shouted.

"Enemies?" Toothiana asked. Jamie shook his head.

Bunnymund laughed. "Then they'd better stay out of the way."

"What are you doing?" Jack asked. Davy pulled Jamie's hat from her belt and swung her legs over the side of the floe.

"I'm going to lure him here with this. Personal objects can distract the Leviathan from the real target for a little while, but he'll want to go after the real thing more than ever once he realizes the dupe."

Davy slipped into the water.

"I've got to go in the water?" Jack asked, uncertain.

"No." Davy said no more. She kicked off the underside of the floe and dolphin-leaped out into the open water. Jack noticed with some amusement that Davy's legs were gone, replaced by a long grey porpoise tail. As he called to the winds to carrying him out over the sea, he wondered just how many of the tails he heard about dolphins rescuing drowned sailors were concocted by disbelieving adults.

Within a few minutes of the selkies' arrival, every kelpie in Santoff Claussen was reduced to piles of decaying seaweed. Yetis tasked with cleaning stuck up their noses at the rotted mess.

"I am glad this happened _after_ Christmas," North said, both sincerely relieved and trying to lighten the atmosphere for his friends. The other Guardians returned shortly, having gone off to look for the missing spirits.

"Jack ain't in his room, mate," Bunnymund said, hopping up from a freshly formed burrow.

"Davy's gone, too," said Toothiana. Her Baby Tooths nodded in unison.

"Any luck, Sandy?"

Sandy made images of a tunnel, footprints and a snowflake. "Are you saying Jack Frost left us?"

Sandy nodded. More dreamsand images- a triton.

"Davy Jones is with him?"

Another nod.

"That irresponsible-"

"Bunnymund, hush!" Toothiana turned to the Sandman. "Go on."

A triton and a snowflake now swirled around a pile of firewood, a flame, and a book. He then pointed to one of the selkies, made talking motions with his hands, then pointed to himself. He conjured one last dreamsand image: a triton and snowflake chasing after a giant fish.

North grabbed his head. Those impatient fools!

"Jack and Davy have gone after the Leviathan," Toothiana said, her voice solemn as she decoded the remaining images. "They're using a something to lure him away."

"My hat," Jamie said. "The one I lost the night Jack and I were playing on the ship."

North turned to the yetis cleaning up. "Make sure seaweed is burned! I want none of kelpies getting out and returning to Leviathan. Am I understood?" The yetis grunted in unison. North turned back to the group.

"Davy told us that portal is in Antarctica," Toothiana told him. "The selkie told Sandy they headed out about twenty minutes before the kelpies attacked us."

North's eyes narrowed.

"Then to Antarctica we will go."


	19. Ch19 - Calling the Leviathan

CHAPTER NINETEEN

"Calling the Leviathan"

Davy Jones flicked her tail back and forth, holding the hat in one hand. She gripped the triton in her other hand, having given the harpoon to one of her sirens. She glanced back and saw the shore line. Selkies- both humanoid and seal-like - and sirens covered every inch of the small icebergs and floes. All of the merpeople had pulled themselves out of the water. The Leviathan might not have been able to smell her, but he could the selkies and sirens.

Right now, the only one's despair she wanted him to sense was _hers_. Not that it took much. She was beginning to lose hope that the Leviathan would show, as she had been sitting in the water for a good hour without so much as a quiver in the current.

_C'mon...c'mon...where are ye hiding, ye wretched excuse for a sea serpent?_

"How long is this supposed to take?"

"As long as it has to."

Jack glanced back from the floe he had made and looked at the shore. "Won't those mermaids dry out when the sun gets overhead?"

"Me sirens can breathe on both land and in water. They just can't switch forms like the selkies."

The wind whistled across the frigid ocean, tiny waves batting the edges of Jack's ice floe. The sky was now a pastel pink with orange streaks far off in the distance as the sun peeked above the horizon. _A storm's coming_, Davy thought, looking up at the thick blanket of clouds above them.

"Hey, Davy?"

"Yeah?"

"How come you never learned to read?"

Davy shrugged. "I can read a few things. Warning signs on the sides of ships, mostly, in several languages. Most everything I've needed to know I've learned from the ocean. Plus, a couple of the selkies can read, ones who were married to humans long ago."

Jack lay down on his stomach and crossed his arms under his chin. "Are you serious? But I thought only the doomed could see you guys."

"The selkies are mortal, just like the sirens. People in Ireland especially used to be very fond of them. Sometimes, Irish lads would wait down by the shore and try to catch a selkie sunning on the shore. They'd steal their skin so they couldn't return to the sea." She looked at Jack, who was deeply enthralled in the mythical history lesson. "Or so the stories go. Not a selkie that has ever lived would let its skin be stolen. And if I was a selkie what caught a bonny lad looking at me, well, why not have me a bit of fun?"

She gave Jack a rakish wink, enjoying the tinge of hypothermic blue that spread across his cheeks and tips of his ears.

"Why, laddie," she grinned playfully, "ye aren't blushing, are ye?"

Jack laughed loudly and swatted his hand through the surf. Davy shook off the chilling water and leered wildly.

"So, ye want to play, do ye?"

"Aye," Jack said, imitating her voice, "I am the Guardian o' Fun, after all."

Davy raked her arm across the water and sent a spray up onto the floe, which Jack returned just as eagerly. Not to be outdone, Davy flicked her tail up and let it beat the surface with a _crack!_ Ocean water went everywhere.

When was the last time she had joked and played like this? Davy couldn't remember. Perhaps it was a good omen.

Jack wiped his face off. "Man, that was loud!"

Davy glanced at her tail, proudly. "It certainly was. I-"

That's when she heard the selkies and sirens shouting from the shore. She looked back and realized that it wasn't her tail that had made such a loud noise. A snow portal had opened!

"Mother of flying fish, it's North!"

"They weren't supposed to wake up for a few more hours! Why are they here?"

"We'd better find out," Davy swore an oath and beat her fist on the water as Jack flew off toward shore.

"It's freezing out here!" Toothiana cried out as she rubbed her arms.

North shrugged. "Is Antarctica. What you be expecting?"

The Tooth Fairy looked to her side. "Are you warm enough, Jamie?"

"Yeah, I'm good, Tooth."

Bundled up in a suit especially designed to handle the Antarctic cold was Jamie Bennet. Unfortunately, its design made him look more like part of a miniature radioactive clean-up crew. The bright red exterior with the Christmas tree emblem on the pocket only added to the suit's outlandishness.

Sandy pointed over the side of the sleigh. "I see them!" Toothiana shouted. "Take us down, North!"

Within moments, amidst the confused cries of selkies and sirens, the sleigh skidded to a halt on the frozen Antarctic ground. Jamie tumbled over the edge of the sleigh and landed on the hard-packed ice. Seconds later, Bunnymund popped up from a tunnel and started complaining about being unable to feel his feet.

Suddenly, Jack Frost floated down beside them.

"Jamie, what are you doing here?"

"The same could be said for you, Frostbite," Bunnymund said, teeth chattering. "Crickey, it's cold out here. You were supposed to wait on us, Frost! This is a team effort!"

"He is right," North said. "No Guardian should be going into danger like this alone."

"Jamie shouldn't be here, North," Jack said. "Davy's calling in the Leviathan. Jamie could get hurt!"

"A bit late for that, mate. Kelpies attacked the workshop this morning."

"What?"

"Workshop is now mess hall." North said.

Toothiana put a hand on Jamie's shoulder. "He is safer with us, Jack."

"Couldn't you have taken him elsewhere? Your palace? Sandy's Dream Castle? The Warren?"

"Not when seaweed was coming through every pipe and puddle in Santoff Claussen!" Bunnymund said.

Jack put a hand to his forehead. _Davy was right. They'll keep hunting Jamie until they finally get him._

"Well, take him back up in the sleigh or something! We need to get Jamie-"

A horrified screech rang out over the ocean. The selkies and sirens, originally chattering in confusion, were now shrieking with terror and alarm. Jack whirled around toward the ocean and saw Davy Jones' dolphin-like figure racing across the water, trying to get back to shore.

Streaking across the ocean behind her, just under the surface, was a great, dark shadow.


	20. Ch20 - Playing With Fire

CHAPTER TWENTY

"Playing with Fire"

The moment Davy saw Jamie's small form tumble out of the sleigh, she knew something had gone terribly wrong. The Guardians wouldn't have brought the boy into harm's way if there hadn't been a greater danger in leaving him behind. She was glad she had posted selkie sentinels outside Santoff Claussen before she left.

In that same moment, she felt the all-too-familiar, all-too-dreadful change in current. In a flurry, she darted under and over the waves, hurrying toward shore as fast as she could swim. Several leaps and dives later, she soared through the air, and then skidded sharply onto the ice. She shoved herself up, the porpoise tail sloughing off her legs like the magic of a broken spell. Instantly, her key was in her hand and formed back into a triton.

She turned and looked over her shoulder. "Run!"

It seemed Jamie Bennet had the idea long before she did. Unfortunately, he was going the wrong way! The moment he saw the black shadow under the water, he took off running away from the group, toward the shore. He was leading the Leviathan away from the Guardians! Davy saw what he was doing and ran toward him, shouting for someone to throw him back into the sleigh. Vaguely, she heard someone echo her words, just as fearfully.

Suddenly, something large and powerful collided with the submerged ice of their little peninsula. Selkies and sirens were thrown or leapt from their positions with frightful cries, pelting the water with loud cracks of awkward splashes. Davy fell and slid a little ways, but then dug her boots into the ice and quickly regained her footing. North was trying to control the reindeer while the other Guardians scanned the ice, trying to find the threat.

The world slowed to a crawl. All sound drowned to a dull, distorted murmur.

Davy's eyes fell to Jamie. He tried to get up but fell back to the snow, a pained look on his face. Then Jack was beside him, looking at the boy's ankle, and trying to pick him up.

She never remembered running.

There was just a blur of white as the snow rushed past and the horror on a child's face.

The shadow rose up around them, enveloping the three of them in total darkness.

Jamie felt the ground surge up around him before he ever saw the monster, but he knew what it was.

_The Leviathan_.

He also knew that, before the maw of the terrible creature closed, blocking out the daylight, there were two pairs of arms around him- one wet and slippery, one caked in frost - shielding him from the rough descent.

He must have fainted, for the next thing he noticed was what resembled pulsating yellow-green lichen on cave walls. Then there was the horrible stench. He rolled over and, barely able to undo the neck zipper and pull off the helmeted part of his suit, was promptly sick all over the side of...

He looked down and saw that he was sitting in what looked like a dinosaur egg, cracked open. Jamie realized quickly it was really ice.

_Jack_.

Jamie looked up and saw two figures standing at the end of what looked to be a stretch of hard ground. Upon seeing the tiny veins in the membrane, the remnants of Jamie's dinner joined his breakfast.

"Jamie!" Jack ran over to check on the boy, carefully maneuvering so as not to tread in the muck. "Eww...I've heard of tossing your cookies, but I never wanted to see what North's sugar cookies looked like partially digested."

Jamie covered his mouth, tempted to spew for a third time. Jack, laughing and a bit more green than blue, apologized. He helped Jamie back on with his helmet. Luckily, the smell wasn't nearly as bad fully suited, but it was still bad.

"Are you alright?" Jamie asked Jack.

"I'm fine. How's the ankle?"

Jamie touched his swollen ankle and hissed. Jack whistled lowly.

"Heading back to school on a sprained ankle. Not fun."

_If I get out of here_, Jamie thought. "Davy?"

The Keeper of the Deep was at the end of the fleshy shoal, arranged a pile of wood taken from her pack. She pulled a few scraps of wrapping paper and a couple of matches out, then secured the rest in waterproof plastic and shoved them back into the bag, along with the book in her belt.

Davy looked back at Jamie.

"We were waiting for you to wake up," she said.

"Yeah, don't want you to miss this," Jack told him. "It is your plan, after all."

"Want to strike the match?"

Jamie, grinning, nodded. With a little help from Jack, Jamie limped over to the edge of the flesh-shoal and knelt down, cupping the match in his hands and placing it against the striking board.

"Ready?" Davy said softly.

The match flared into life.

Jamie stuck it to the bits of paper and watched them alight. The wood, mostly dried driftwood, was soon a stage of dancing flames. Jamie stood up, Davy holding one of his hands and Jack the other, as they watched the smoke creep up. After a few minutes, Jack led Jamie back to the far end of the membrane and helped him into the ice. Then Davy was adding cedar pieces and green wood. She picked up a jar and undid the lid.

"Might want to plug your ears," Davy said. Jamie ducked back down in the ice-eggshell, hands pressed to the sides of his suit-helmet. Davy flung the entire contents of the jar onto the fire and leapt back just in time. There was a flash and a loud _BOOM!_ rocked the Leviathan's stomach, sending up an enormous smoke cloud and nearly incinerating the wood underneath.

Jamie looked up, expecting the see the Leviathan's blowhole open to let out the smoke, but it didn't.

Even in the soft light, Jamie could see the frozen patch of ice covering it, strains of frost creeping outward like bits of a spider web.

As he watched the smoke billow up, Jamie gripped the sides of the ice-eggshell.

_This is gonna work,_ he thought. _It just has to!_

When Davy Jones had told him about her mission that night in Alaska, it scared Jamie. However, when he listened to Davy talk about some of the things she had seen, he realized that, looking into her eyes, she was scared, too. Scared of losing another person to the great demon whom she had hunted for...for how long? Jamie made a note to ask her if he got out of the Leviathan alive.

When_ I get out_, Jamie told himself. He had to believe this would work. If it didn't he was as good as dead. He would never see his parents, friends or Sophie again. He'd never see another Christmas or Easter, never have another good dream, never lose another tooth or have another snowball fight.

And Davy Jones?

Did he really want to be another horrible failure buried in her memory?

_Think positive_, he thought. _If I could help the Guardians with Pitch, who says I can't help Davy Jones? I just gotta get out of a big fish, that's all. This is going to work. I know it is. I _believe_ it is. I've gotta believe. I've gotta believe. I believe-_

The stomach rocked.

"Huh?"

Jamie could hear a low rumbling from deeper in the stomach caverns.

Davy gasped, and then ducked her head and started adding more of the green wood to the fire. She pulled her bandanna from her head and began fanning it, doing everything she could to make the smoke bigger.

"Whew," Jack wiped his brow, "I hope this plan of yours works soon. I think I'm going to melt!"

The rumbling increased.

"I think it's working," Davy murmured.

The stomach rocked.

Jamie crossed his fingers. _I believe, I believe, I believe-_

"Cover him up!"

Jack shoved Jamie down into the ice shell, and then a thick lid of ice swept over his frozen bed. Jamie pounded on the interior, uncertain of what was going on. He saw Jack smiling, on hand on the side of the ice quickly disappear as the ice thickened.

It was too dark for Jamie to see anymore, but from all of the rocking about, he knew something big was about to happen.


	21. Ch21 - Victory Almost

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

"Victory!…Almost"

The Leviathan knew something was wrong when he felt the piercing cold against his blowhole. He surfaced immediately, ignoring the assault by the many selkies and sirens, and tried to take in a breath.

It wouldn't come.

To make matters worse, there was an itchy, weighed feel clogging up his lungs, and it was getting denser and scratchier by the second. He thrashed about in the water, hoping his stomach acid would douse whatever the trouble was, but by that time, harpoons, daggers, blades of every kind stabbed him from every side.

Then there was the little red sleigh, and the sharp sting as golden sand pelted his eyes.

The Leviathan rose up from the ocean, and roared mightily to the heavens.

"That's our cue!" Jack shouted.

Davy grabbed hold of one of the handles Jack fashioned on the ice egg protecting Jamie, and then dashed her triton against the acid. The water separated from it, sending them surging toward the esophageal opening in a watery cyclone. The little ring of muscle opened and-

"Wind?"

Jack whooped loudly, surprised by their good luck. "Wind, take us out of here!"

Clenching tightly to the handle, the bitterly cold wind washing over her instead of ocean spray, Davy felt herself lifted up and out, through the maws of the demon whom had been her enemy for so long, into the daylight. Then she was falling, careening toward the earth and ocean again…

And nearly had her arm ripped off when the ice-eggshell landed in North's sleigh and she bounced over the side, still clinging to the handle. Davy screamed as bright lights danced over her vision. Someone yanked her back into the sleigh.

"Dear MiM, that hurts!" she said, laying back against the seat and holding her shoulder.

"Here, let me see."

Davy opened her bleary eyes as Toothiana took hold of her arm and shoulder, and then shoved it. _Hard_. Davy squalled. Suddenly, the pain was gone, leaving a dull ache from her dislocated arm. She gingerly touched her joint, and then looked at the Tooth Fairy through bleary eyes. "Thanks," she said weakly.

"Anytime."

Davy sat up and saw Jack put his ear to the ice-eggshell. "Oh, I wonder what it could be..." He gave the ice a playful tap with his staff. It cracked and fell apart, allowing the boy inside to shove his way out. Jack slapped one hand to his face and cried out in mock-surprise, "Oh, wow, it's a Baby Bennet!" He looked at Davy and Toothiana and winked. "Do you know how rare these things are?"

"Jack!" Jamie's arms darted out and went around Jack's neck in a hug. Jack eagerly returned the embrace. Jamie saw where he was and shouted, "We did it, Jack! We really did it!"

"We sure did, kid." Jack looked up at Davy and smiled. "We sure did."

Toothiana's arm shot out in from of Davy.

"I don't think you guys want to miss this!"

Davy turned and looked over the side of the sleigh. The Leviathan- which resembled more of a giant, dark blue lamprey with a catfish's maw and fifty feet of hard, tumor-ridden flesh -was writhing in the ocean, little streams of light pouring out from it. Then many of the pods of bulbous flesh opened up like grotesque flower pods, releasing golden, glowing balls of light into the air. The lights floated upward, disappearing past the sleigh. A few stopped and floated around them.

"What are they?" Toothiana asked, giggling as she saw one bounce into a Baby Tooth and spin her around in the air.

"The souls of the innocent-"

Davy stopped as one orb came to rest in front of her. Reflected for just a moment inside was the face of the sea captain's son, no longer horrified but overflowing with an unearthly joy not suited for the mortal realm. It floated over, kissing the tip of her nose with its warm radiance, before floating skyward and fading from sight.

Davy's eyes blurred over, but not just from the ache in her shoulder.

"Well, look at that," Jack said. "Who knew Davy Jones really knew how to smile?"

Davy laughed- a genuine, happy laugh - and wiped her eyes on her soggy blouse sleeve. The sleigh dove down, coming to rest on the ice. Davy saw the Leviathan's attack had practically split the peninsula in two and turned most of it into icebergs. When she hopped out of the sleigh, she saw her selkies and sirens were still hard at war with the demon.

"Next time we have to fight a monster, let's pick one that doesn't involve flying or getting thrown into the ocean, alright? I've got icicles between my toes, for MiM's sake!"

Davy couldn't help but laugh at Bunnymund, the only Guardian who stayed grounded. He was thoroughly soaked and was being fluffed dry by a couple of selkie women who, against all impossibilities, managed to find a couple of dry towels in the Antarctic. He didn't seem nearly as upset when one started rubbing him behind the ears, and both selkies giggled when Bunnymund began thumping one of his feet happily.

She looked out over the ocean, curling her fingers around her triton.

There was still one thing she had to do.


	22. Ch22 - Giving The Devil His Due

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

"Giving the Devil His Due"

"Keep the kid in the sleigh and get back to the sky!"

"Hey!" Jack shouted after Davy. "Where are you going?"

He didn't stop to wait for an answer as the winds carried him over the ice. Davy Jones slipped off the edge, dolphin-leaping out of the water in her mermaid form. She was headed out across the ocean. Right toward the Leviathan.

Jack swooped down low to the sea. "What are you doing?"

"Finishing-" _Splash!_ "-this once and-" _Splash!_ "-for all!" _Splash!_

Jack, upon seeing that Davy's triton was gone, realized what she was planning to do. He floated up on the winds, watching the Keeper of the Deep boldly swim up to the face of the very demon she had fought all of these years.

_Gone!_

The innocent souls he had collected for over four-and-a-half centuries were gone! He could feel the loss of their weight, the corrupted tumors of flesh trapping them in torment having sloughed from his body, leaving him nearly smooth and slimy as a newborn eel.

It was cold, and he was vulnerable.

For once in many years, he could feel the harpoons piercing his flesh. They _hurt_ him.

_It is _her_ fault! Her fault I hurt! Her fault my innocent souls have escaped! _

His hatred for Davy Jones, for the Man in the Moon who created her and the Guardians that had stopped his consuming the boy and freed his souls was now the only thing that fueled him. Ever since she began interfering, he had been forced to feed on the despair of souls he had used and overused throughout the years. It was like sucking on a bone days after the marrow was gone. The was no nourishment, and he had weakened.

Now he would have to begin again. But how could he reach a 100 innocent souls before MiM's wretched creations?

He knew now he had no chance. He would never return to Hell. Even if he did, without 100 pure souls, it would be _he_ that would be confined to everlasting torment.

_Curse you, Man in the Moon! Curse you Guardians! Curse you Davy-_

"LEVIATHAN!"

The demon turned. Who would dare call out his name so defiantly?

Then he saw _her_!

_HER!_

She was waving one of her arms out of the water, shouting and splashing her porpoise tail. The Leviathan always hated that form of hers the most. That she should be able to move through the seas as _he_ did! Pure, utter revulsion washed over him.

"Come and get me, you overgrown codfish!"

He didn't need to be told twice.

His senses gone, it didn't matter to him that he had failed to consume her the few times she had ventured into his gullet. No, he would clamp his massive jowls around her! Crush her! Bash her against every available surface until she was nothing more than a wounded pulp of a jellyfish! Then he would seek out the Guardians and do the same. With nothing and no one to stop him, he would rampage the sevens seas until all humans died of thirst, in fear of the water, or at the bottom of his stomach!

Never had Davy Jones seen the Leviathan so out of his mind with rage.

Riding the highs of adrenaline and elation- she hadn't felt such happiness in all of her days as Davy Jones -she swam back to the cliff faster than she had ever swam before. It was the Leviathan and Davy Jones. Just the two of them, locked in a race that would shortly end and free the world of a horrible menace.

_Just as it should be_.

Her heart was light with the forgiveness of the sea captain's son and all the innocents she had failed, of helping one boy come out alive.

It was a great comfort, knowing Davy Jones would pass from this world at peace.

As Davy neared the cliff, she dolphin-leaped into the tunnel and slid on her belly all the way to the end, not bothering with the transformation. Stabbing one of her many daggers into the wall, she pulled herself up and swept away the ice for the keyhole hidden to mortal eyes.

Just as the Leviathan reached the end of the tunnel, she yanked the chain from her neck, shoved the key in, and turned it.

The Leviathan never realized what Davy Jones was planning until it was too late. He had hurled himself up out of the water at the cliff-side tunnel, suddenly realizing where his little nemesis had led him. He tried to turn back and he could have- or, in the very least, rocked himself in the tunnel until it collapsed. It would have crushed Davy Jones and he would have freed himself eventually. If not for one little problem:

He had been frozen solid the moment he left the water.

He careened, unable to roar because his mighty jaws were iced shut, all the way through the tunnel. He saw MiM's little whelp hit the wall and-

No, she wasn't _hitting_ the wall!

_She was opening the gateway to Hell!_

Feeling his own despair welling up for the first time in his many-millienia existence, the Levithan could do nothing to stop his one-way ticket to the inferno.

_At least I will have taken that blasted Davy Jones with me!_

But as he barreled down the tunnel, Davy slipped back to the floor-

-_and down a rabbit hole, just barely big enough for the Keeper of the Deep._


	23. Ch23 - New Beginnings

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

"New Beginnings"

What made Davy Jones open her eyes it wasn't from the biting flames of Hell. It was from slamming into and careening across ice.

She looked up to see Bunnymund, his fur sticking out in odd places from being half-fluffed and exposed to the Antarctic air, hop out of the burrow. "You're welcome," he said, turning away from her to the many pats on the back he was getting from his friends.

Davy looked around and saw the cliff where the portal was come crashing down, disappearing into the sea. The distant image of Jack Frost drifted over and shortly landed on the ice nearby. He was grinning.

"What happened?" Davy asked. "The Leviathan-"

"Looked like a giant fishy popsicle as he slid right through the gates of Hell," Jack told her. "Your key's gone, though. I guess you'll just have to make a new triton if you want to make a shish-kabob out of me, huh?"

Davy stared up at Jack Frost, unable to speak for several long moments. The first thing that came to mind was stupid, but, not knowing what else to say, she said it anyway:

"You _froze_ the Leviathan?"

"Yup," he pointed his staff toward Bunnymund. "And ol' Cottontail over there turned out to be of some use after all. Didn't ya', buddy?"

Davy glanced up at Bunnymund, who was now being fawned over by not two, but _five_ selkies. Bunnymund just shrugged.

"Well, I couldn't let you guys have all the fun."

Davy couldn't believe what she was hearing. The Leviathan was gone. The gate to Hell- the only one he could pass through -was destroyed. No more fighting off kelpies just so someone could die without torment. No more memories of children and their families sucked into those jaws of doom. No more watching children die! No more!

In scarcely an hour, her entire lifetime as Davy Jones was vindicated.

For the first time in many long years, Davy Jones bowed her head, the water dripping from her hair, let her own tears fall free.

"Thank you all," she managed to choke out, "from the bottom of my heart."

The yetis were still cleaning up the workshop when the Guardians returned. North had a post-Christmas party to prepare and it didn't take much to coax Davy Jones and her selkies to help. The Keeper of the Deep felt responsible for the damage, as did Jamie (though, because of his sprained ankle, he wasn't able to do much).

Jack watched as Davy tacked up the beads Jamie restrung. He thought it strange to see Davy Jones without her customary scowl or a maniacal leer, but he liked the change. After all, Davy was a leader of mermaids and seal-people. What sort of ocean animal could play better than a seal, or could sing as beautifully as mermaids could? It was only fitting their leader remained in good spirits.

"Since the Leviathan's gone, what are you going to do now?" Jamie asked as he handed up another strand.

Davy shrugged. "I haven't given it much thought," she admitted. "The Man in the Moon only told me I could fight the Leviathan. I thought that was my purpose for being."

"If it was your only purpose, you would have disappeared by now," Toothiana pointed out.

"Perhaps Davy Jones has more important purpose now that fishy demon is gone?" North suggested. Davy, again, shrugged. Sandy conjured up several dreamsand images, and then smiled and gave her a thumbs-up. Jack laughed.

"Sandy thinks you'd make a good lifeguard."

Davy spared a chuckle. "Perhaps he's right." She hopped down from the stepladder. High above, she could see the deep azure of a clear morning sky. It was as if defeating the Leviathan had broken a spell over the world. She certainly felt that way about herself. She looked up at the sunlit sky and saw the Moon making a rare appearance during the day as if to say _Job well done._ She smiled.

"Are you going to be alright without your triton?" Jack asked. "I've been there before." He motioned to his staff. "It's not cool when you lose something that is such a big part of yourself."

Davy, however, shook her head. "The triton was merely a tool. I can open water channels without it. Although," she grinned playfully, "I guess I won't be making any more ship-sinking whirlpools."

"Thank MiM for that," Jack said, laughing. He turned and saw North give him a broad wink. The other Guardians meandered over. Jack walked over and took his place between Toothiana and Jamie. He saw a yeti poke one of its friends and point toward the group. Soon, with scarcely a murmur, a loose semi-circle of spirits and mythological creatures gathered around. Davy looked around, concerned, until she noticed that most everyone was smiling.

"Davy Jones," North boomed, "it has come to our attention that, for the past four hundred and sixty-seven years, you have not once received Christmas present. So," he said, turning and taking a long box from two yetis, "today, four hundred sixty-seven years and one day later, it gives me great pleasure to give you this."

Davy was more than stunned when North held out the long box for her to take. It was wrapped in the darkest blue Christmas paper with tiny snowmen sprinkled across it, topped with a large golden bow and a massive bunch of shiny, curling ribbons. Even after North practically shoved the gift into her hands, it took several minutes for her to understand its true meaning:

Forgiveness and acceptance.

Bunnymund was the one who broke the ice. "Do you have seawater instead of a brain? Open the present already!"

Smiling, she turned to Jamie and asked him if he wanted to help her. Like any other child, Jamie eagerly agreed. The wrapping paper tore free and Davy pulled off the lid, dropping it to the side in shock as she reached inside with trembling hands.

The triton was hundreds of times more amazing than the wicked instrument she once used. The pole was of smooth and polished black metal, light enough for wielding and throwing but strong enough to withstand the struggles of any hapless fish. The fork was of equal quality, its spear points razor-sharp and tapered with hooks. Davy turned it over in the light, admiring the way the silvery metal glinted in the light. She ran her fingers down the curve of it, noticing the steel rune-lined band attaching the two pieces together.

"My mentor was the last survivor of Atlantis," North explained. "We felt the runes were fitting."

"What's it say?" Jamie asked.

"_Leviathan Carnis_. 'Slayer of Big Fish'."

Davy could only stare at the new weapon. "Do you think you can use it as well as your old one?" Toothiana asked. Davy nodded and stood, beaming widely as she tested the weight of it in her hand. She practically danced as she swept through mock spearing strikes, lunging and twirling the triton over between her fingers and wrists as weightlessly as a baton. Finally, she struck the pole end to the ground and looked at the amused looks on the Guardians' faces.

"Thank you all," she told them, "for everything."

A murmur of assent was the reply. Jack looked up at the clock. By the time Jamie returned home, it would be sunrise. As if on cue, Jamie yawned.

"Time to go, kid," he said as he walked over and helped Jamie to his feet. North pulled out a snow globe and, saying the location, tossed it to the ground. Davy walked over and joined Jack and Jamie.

"I need to dismiss the selkie sentinels," she told them. "Unless you want your dog barking until she is hoarse."

Jamie, smiling, shook his head. Just as they were about to step through the portal, North shouted to them. "Do not be forgetting party!"

Davy looked over at Jack and shook her head. "Does he honestly think you would miss out on a chance to have fun?" Davy jumped when she heard North's voice boom behind her:

"I did not mean only Jack Frost."

Davy Jones turned and looked at the big man and other Guardians. Jack nudged her shoulder with his staff. His smile was soft and genuine. "You might not be a Guardian," Jack said, "but you were willing to do whatever you could to keep a child from suffering. I realize that now."

He straightened, his staff held at attention, but Davy could hear there was more than a little awkwardness in his voice. _Is this how he apologizes?_ Looking at the normal cocky and carefree spirit, she wouldn't be surprised if apologies were a rarity with that one. When he held out his hand, however, her cynicism flew out the metaphorical window.

"You were right there on the ice with me, shielding Jamie when the Leviathan took us under. Since you helped me save the first kid to believe in Jack Frost, then Jack Frost will be the first Guardian to call Davy Jones 'friend'." Jack smiled warmly. "What do you say?"

Davy looked to Jamie, to the other Guardians, her selkies, and finally back to Jack. A wicked grin spread across her face.

"Only if you promise never to speak in third-person again."

"I will if you stop switching accents."

Davy clasped his hand in hers, playfully squeezing slightly too hard. "Not for all the salt in the sea, laddie. Not for all the salt in the sea."


	24. Epilogue

EPILOGUE

Jamie Bennet wondered if he would ever have a normal holiday. That certainly hadn't been the case since befriending the Guardians. Jamie couldn't argue though. "Normal" was highly overrated.

The Easter following his nearly disastrous venture at sea, Jamie was safely back in Burgess, watching his little sister Sophie run squealing to their mother every time she found a new egg. His mother didn't think anything of the odd decorations on the eggs. She simply thought that her son and his friends were becoming little artists. Jamie saw no reason to tell her otherwise.

Bunnymund, however, couldn't accept the overly marine designs on many of his eggs that year. But hey, what did he expect when he let his new selkie fan club help him?

Jamie laughed. After Bunnymund saved Davy Jones in Antarctica, the Pooka had become a hero among the sirens and selkies. It got to the point where he was almost afraid to take a bath, since more than once he had walked to the tub and found a mermaid lounging in it, waiting for him with some pretty seashell or pearl as a gift. At least he convinced them to stay out of the paint rivers. There were still many pastel-blue seals and sirens swimming the world's seas, having gone a little too far with their hero worship by dousing themselves in dye the same shade as Bunnymund.

Jack Frost had fared better, considering he didn't often get close to water very much to be glomped by Davy Jones' compatriots. He came to see Jamie often, once every few weeks, and always had some new story to tell.

Davy came to see him, too.

Without the Leviathan to fight anymore, the Keeper of the Deep didn't know what to do with herself. She'd still rescue people from drowning, push a ball or surfer closer to shore and away from an otherwise unnoticed riptide, but that left room for a _lot_ of leisure time. Lately, she had been coming to Jamie with her newest pursuit- one he proudly took the credit for starting.

"Bennet!"

He looked over his shoulder. Guess who was standing by the birdbath?

"You didn't come out of that, did you?"

Davy laughed and shook her head. "The pond," she told him. "It isn't all that far from here." Jamie grinned and nodded. He followed Davy's gaze and saw he watching Sophie running about. "I'm not interrupting, am I?"

"Not at all," he said. "I was going to head to Monty's. Do you want to come along?"

Davy nodded. "I'll meet you by the street."

"So what have you been up to?"

"I've been reading that fairytale book you loaned me," Davy said proudly. Jamie noticed her eyes almost sparkled when she mentioned her newfound skill.

"I still can't believe it managed to survive."

Davy had the book wrapped in waterproof binding and crammed into her belt almost the whole time they were in Antarctica. Surprisingly, though it had been submerged in seawater and nearly doused in stomach acid, it came out unscathed. As both a gesture of forgiveness and in gratitude at helping save his life, Jamie gave her the book. Along with reading and grammar lessons, of course.

"So what story is your favorite?"

"I thought it would be _Pinocchio_, but I'm finding that I like _The Little Mermaid_ more and more."

Jamie snickered. _It figures...she's kind of one._

"What?"

"Nothing," Jamie told her. "Hey, there's Monty! Hey, Monty!"

The freckled blonde turned and saw his friend walking down the street. To what was surely Davy's surprise, he noticed her, too.

"Wow..." Monty stared up at her, mouth agape.

"Monty, this is Davy Jones."

At Jamie's cue, Davy did a sweeping bow, letting her long curly hair fall over her shoulders and looking at Monty through charmingly lowered eyelids. "The pleasure is all mine, _Monsieur_ Monty."

Jamie glanced sideways at her, trying not to grin. _Laying it on a little thickly, aren't you?_ They had practiced her introduction long before. Jamie told Monty about what happened, considering he didn't want his friend to think he'd lost his mind and couldn't remember seeing Jamie off at the bus station. After all, it was kinda Jamie's fault Monty and his aunt and uncle's family slept nearly two days in a row. At least they woke up ready and raring for Christmas!

"Hey, Monty?"

With much difficulty, Monty tore his eyes away from Davy. Davy was smiling widely. Jamie guessed it was the first time a child had seen her in awe without tearing for the hills. That, and the fact that Monty was blushing. _Someone has a crush! _Jamie suppressed a laugh.

"Y-yeah?"

"Do you remember what you asked me while we were on deck?"

"You mean me shouting if you were alright when you went tumbling off?"

Jamie shook his head. "No, before that."

Monty thought for a few minutes, and then his eyes lit up.

"Yeah, I asked you if sea monsters exist."

Jamie turned and looked up at Davy.

Pulling herself up to her full height, stepping out into a strong, confidant pose, one hand on her hip and the other flicking her long hair back over her shoulder, Davy Jones smirked.

"Not anymore."

**DARKLING IMP:**

**Well, that's all she wrote. Perhaps it was a bit dark, considering the K+ rating and movie/book material from which the story was derived. The first chaptered fanfic I've ever finished. That's a powerful statement, considering how many stories I've started and never finished in the past. Well, I hope you all enjoyed reading this as much as I did writing it.**


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